The Last Jedi
by Darth Marrs
Summary: There are no Jedi; no Sith. There are Abnormals—persons born with a midi-chlorian count proscribed at a dangerous level by the Galactic Empire. Those persons are euthanized immediately upon discovery. That is, until they come for the son of the last Jedi.
1. Far From A Normal Life

**The Last Jedi**

Characters: OCs

Era: Future 332 NE (462 ABY)

Summary: There are no Jedi. There are no Sith. There are Abnormals—persons born with a midi-chlorian count proscribed at a dangerous level by the Galactic Empire. Those persons are euthanized immediately upon discovery. When one abnormal boy is discovered and taken to his fate, the last living Jedi steps forward to set his feet upon the path of a new history.

This story is inspired by a vignette by too_old4this called "Were they real?" Thanks to Jedi-Aurelan-Carter for beta reading the first 5 chapters.

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**The Last Jedi**

**Part I: Fugitive**

**Chapter One: Far From A Normal Life**

On his tenth lifeday, which happened to fall on the second school day of the week before Unity Day on the 332nd year of the New Era, Tobin S'Artin was sentenced to death.

"For Genetic abnormalities detrimental to the well being of the Empire," was the way the local magistrate put it as he read from the flimsi proclamation. The magistrate had come to Tobin's school with two real-life troopers who carried real-life blaster bracers and stared at Tobin as if he were a hardened criminal.

The other students were staring at him as well, only in stunned silence. This was just Tobin—the quiet kid who laughed at the silly humor strips on his palm reader; who was so shy he couldn't talk to girls; who was beat up on his second day of school by Sha'rad the Rodian who terrorized all the students in their age-group.

"I don't understand," Tobin said. "Where's my mom?"

The magistrate stared coldly at the boy. "Jalia S'Artin is also being taken into custody on charges of genetic abnormalities detrimental to the Empire, falsifying official genetic records and harboring a known abnormal child."

In the back of the class Sha'rad snickered. Tobin turned and stared, stricken. He was going to die and the little Rodian toad was laughing?

"Is there no appeal?" his teacher Soola Dayaala asked. Her blue lekku spilled over her shoulder as she assumed a pleading stance. Though Tobin was only ten, his mother had taught him to read body language. He noticed the way Miss Dayaala leaned forward to expose more of her sea-colored cleavage even as she assumed an expression of hope and trust. It was effective, but not effective enough.

The magistrate's expression softened slightly before the teacher's imploring stance, but he still shook his head. "His tests were rechecked last week by the school nurse and the order was confirmed by the Secretary of Genetic Purity on Corusca. The child and his mother both have the abnormal markers. She knowingly falsified his first tests to hide the fact when they immigrated to this world. There is nothing we can do. His existence is a threat to the Pax Galactica that has given us all peace for these past two hundred years."

The larger man flicked his fingers and the two troopers stepped forward.

Now, Tobin, a familiar voice whispered in his mind. Run now!

With a frightened cry, Tobin held out his hand and pushed. One of the troopers flew backward with such velocity that he cracked the wall lining. The push clipped the second trooper on his shoulder and sent him spinning. Students started screaming and scrambling away from Tobin the Abnormal, for fear of being contaminated.

Tobin spun on his heel and pushed at the window. The window blew open as if from a strong breeze. Tobin did not hesitate as he leaped head-first through the opening.

The first rule: any time you enter a building you must find all the ways to get out of it, his mother told him. He was only five at the time and didn't really understand the reasons behind the rule. He didn't need to. His mother did not require understanding, only obedience. And so when the two of them immigrated to Nalderaan last year and he started his new school, the first thing he did was check to see if the windows were actually functional or just for display. He checked all the entrances to the main tower; he studied the ventilation system of the building; and then he'd prepared a report to his mother on how he would escape if there were a fire.

Or if troopers came with an Imperial magistrate to kill him.

He felt his mother's presence in his head now. She was coming for him; he just had to stay alive long enough for her to reach him.

All these thoughts passed through his mind in the three seconds between when he jumped out of the window to when he landed one floor down on the soft orange-green grass of the school grounds.

He rolled the moment his feet touched the ground to help absorb the force of the impact. He had just the barest moment of warning in his mind—just a split second to jump—before the ground exploded in a shower of dirt. He rolled away and saw another trooper pointing his bracer blaster at him.

Tobin managed a terrified squeal before he scrambled to his feet and ducked behind an annex building. The moment he was hidden from view he took a breath to summon the Force and jumped as hard as he could. The jump was just high enough for him to catch the edge of the roof. He pulled himself over the edge with a grunt and then rolled away. He heard the crunch of the trooper's boots below him.

The man was probably reporting that Tobin was hiding, but Tobin would never know for sure. Trooper helmets were self contained and were only audible when the trooper wanted to be heard.

Tobin started crawling over the roof of the annex when he felt eyes on him. He turned and looked at the main school tower. In every window, on every floor, thousands of his classmates were staring at him. One girl on the third floor even waved at him. Her name was Seela Flist. She was a year younger than him and sat with him once at lunch.

He wanted to wave back, but he was simply too afraid. If the children could see him—he spun around at the sound of thrusters and saw the trooper from before clearing the edge of the roof.

"Halt!" the trooper shouted.

Tobin held up his hands.

"On your knees!" the trooper barked.

Tobin dropped to his knees. The trooper walked toward him with his bracer held level at Tobin's face. "Please don't kill me," Tobin whispered.

"Shut up!" the man said. He stomped forward and back-handed Tobin with his gauntlet. The power of the impact sent the ten-year-old boy spinning across the roof. He saw stars and tasted blood. His whole face felt numb.

He turned and saw the trooper walking toward him. The bracer was no longer pointed at him—the trooper walked with a confident swagger. Why not be confident? Abnormal or not, what could a child do to him?

Tobin screamed as he harnessed the Force just as his mother taught him. The trooper let out a brief "What the…" before he was gripped in the invisible power of Tobin's mind. Tobin spun about and flung the trooper across the space between the annex and the tower. The trooper somersaulted in the air and struck the main tower head-first with a sickening crack against a closed, shatter-proof window. He fell boneless to the turf while the children who had been standing at that window backed away screaming. Tobin could not hear them, but he could imagine the sound easily enough from their horrified faces.

Tobin had killed a man. He had killed an Imperial Trooper.

He looked up at the windows. Seela was no longer waving at him.

He turned away from the tower and ran across the roof of the annex. He could hear more thruster packs as other troopers took up the chase. Two cleared the edge of the roof behind him and immediately started firing.

He could feel the sizzling red bolts as he dodged left and right. Growing up, dodging stunners had been a game he played with his mother. They would go to a park or some other out of way place with no people and shoot at each other with little self-defense stunners.

Now he dodged blaster bolts that could vaporize his chest in a microsecond.

He could not dodge the roof, though. A volley of blaster bolts struck the roof of the school and sent Tobin flying over the far edge in an uncontrolled tumble. He ducked and spun as he was taught, but didn't have enough time to recover his balance before he hit.

He heard a snap and screamed in pain as his ankle folded under him.

I'm sorry, Mother, he cried in his mind. The two troopers reached the edge of the roof and hopped down without even bothering with their thrusters. The augmented joints of the armor easily absorbed the pressure of their landing. Two more stepped around the back of the annex, followed by the magistrate himself. The magistrate's face was livid with rage.

Tobin looked away. He didn't want to see the bolt that killed him. Instead, he looked across the lawn at the playground for the early learning center next door. There were several dozen children there, six through eight years of age, still in the eidetic imprinting stage of their education. The teachers were staring as well, and seemed so shocked they didn't even think to gather their charges to safety.

"Enough of this," the magistrate said. "He is obviously dangerous, even for one his age. Troopers, shoot him now."

Tobin squeezed his eyes shut against the tears. He heard a primal cry of terror without realizing it was him making the noise. He felt a sudden jerk just as he heard the sound of blaster bracers firing and found himself flying through the air. A moment later he felt arms around his shoulders and a blessedly familiar presence in his mind. "Mother!" he cried. "I'm sorry."

Jalia S'Artin stared down at him with a sad smile on her red lips. Flaming red hair fell about her oval-shaped face, while green eyes blazed with both compassion for him, and fury for those who would do him harm.

"Stay here," Jalia whispered. She stood, straddling him.

"Jalia S'Artin," the magistrate said. "Why am I not surprised you escaped? Know that you and your abnormal whelp have been found to possess genetic abnormalities detrimental to the well-being of the Empire. You are to be executed at once." He nodded to the four troopers. "Kill her."

A blue beam of light snapped on with a hum. The magistrate's eyes widened, but the troopers did not hesitate. They opened fire with their bracers.

The blue lightsaber seemed to take on a life of its own; spinning with such speed Tobin could not even follow the actual blade. It seemed instead a blue wall of energy protected him, sending the blaster bolts back to those shooting.

The troopers, however, were not just mindless soldiers. To be an Imperial trooper meant four years of the toughest training in the galaxy. One man did fall in the first volley of returned fire, but the other three rolled away to better flank the lone woman and the son she fought to protect.

Jalia was hampered by her need to protect Tobin. Tobin could see she was limited almost solely to defense. She needed help.

He was not as good at pulling things as he was at pushing, but his mother had been teaching him all of his life. He concentrated on the fallen trooper. He briefly thought about trying to summon just the bracer, but remembered his lessons. The bracer was connected to the whole suit of armor and drew power from the supply pack over the thruster assembly.

Instead, he concentrated on the whole body. With a surge of will, Tobin pulled the man not toward himself, but toward the trooper on their right. The trooper in question did not even see his fallen comrade until the body plowed into him, sending both to the ground.

Suddenly, having to fight only two opponents, Jalia darted forward with blurry speed and flashed her saber at one man while holding out her left hand toward the other. The first man fell to the ground in two pieces; the second let out a startled shout before he was lifted off his feet and thrust backward so hard he actually tore through the permacrete wall of the school annex. Even armored, there was no way he could survive such a blow.

The remaining trooper was trying to push his fallen comrade off him when Jalia reached him and with a swipe of her lightsaber sent the man's head rolling toward the early education center.

The young children and teachers stood as if paralyzed, watching the whole encounter. They watched, that is, until the helmeted head came rolling toward them. The children started to scream while the teachers attempted to corral them back into the school.

Throughout the battle the magistrate stood frozen in place, his face an unreadable mask. In a way, it was rather brave.

Jalia knelt down beside her son. "Can you walk?"

"I think it's broken," he said through his tears of pain.

She placed a hand on the ankle. It instantly went numb. "You're going to pay for that later," she said, "but I can't afford to carry you." She looked up at the magistrate and flicked a hand. The man stumbled forward.

"Where is your transport?"

"I won't help you," the magistrate said. Though there was a tremor in his voice, his face remained unreadable. "The law is clear. Your power is the result of a disease that has caused chaos and bloodshed throughout the history of the galaxy. For the sake of the whole Empire, you and your son must die."

"Try it and you die, and my son and I will escape regardless."

"You think so?" The magistrate shook his head. "You are not the first Abnormals we've encountered."

"But I will be your last," Jalia said.

The magistrate stared. "You cannot escape."

"You cannot stop me," Jalia countered. "Step aside."

He lifted his chin. "I believe in the justness of the Empire's laws. Kill me if you must—I will not move."

With an impatient sigh Jalia waved her hand again. The magistrate was tossed bodily against the annex, although not with the power as the previous trooper. "I am not Abnormal," she growled to the man. "I am a Jedi. If I were anything else, you would be dead by now. Remember that."

"The Jedi are a myth. You are nothing more or less than a curse on the face of the galaxy," the magistrate said from the ground. "Rest assured, I will remember you."

Freed of obvious enemies, she took Tobin's hand and the two ran around the annex toward the front of the school grounds. There they saw the armored Imperial transport van waiting for them. A single trooper stood guard.

Tobin watched as his mother let go and ran forward so fast she blurred again. The trooper barely had time to lift his bracer before she cut him down. Once he was down, Tobin made his way to the transport. He was limping and could actually feel a grinding sensation in his ankle, but because of his mother's power it remained numb.

His mother did not speak as she activated the transport van's controls and they soared into the sky. He had never seen her fly anything—they always took public transportation either to school or to the commerce centers. But as he watched her hands move across the controls with confidence and precision, he realized that she must have learned how to fly from somewhere.

"Mother," he started to say.

Gently, she reached across and placed her finger against his lips. "Not now, Tobin," she said. He knew her well enough to see the tension and fear in her eyes, and the way her nostrils flared with each breath. He realized then that she had never been so angry in her life.

Suddenly she pulled the control wheel out and the van pulled up into a steep climb. Only then did Tobin see a pair of fighters descending on them. He held his breath and pulled the safety harness tighter as his stomach turned.

The fighters obviously weren't expecting the van to turn directly into their path. They fired a few shots from their cannons, but quickly swerved out of the way. Almost as soon as they were view, Jalia pushed the wheel in and the van turned and began plummeting toward the streets of the city below.

Nalderaan was a relatively new world, but even so its capital city was large. The van fell in between shining white towers toward the first of the sky roads. The two fighters followed right behind.

The traffic continued apace without any clue as to the danger approaching. Tobin couldn't help but release a squeal as the van shot through the center of the traffic. The two fighters followed, but being larger, both impacted on passing traffic.

One fighter struck a tibanna transport. The explosion immediately engulfed the other fighter and perhaps fifty other vehicles, all of which fell burning out of the sky.

The van's descent ended abruptly just meters above the permacrete surface of the city floor. Jalia leaned forward, peering through the windows until she found what she wanted. She brought the van to a halt and turned to her son. "Get out and go stand on that curb there."

"What?"

"Now, Tobin!" she barked.

Tobin did as he was told. He watched as the van soared up and away, leaving her standing on the other side. She kept her eyes on the van as she backed slowly toward him.

A moment later a second pair of fighters swooped toward the van, green cannons blasting away. The van disappeared in a ball of fire, and then ceased to exist.

With a curt nod to herself, Jalia grabbed Tobin's arm and led him up the sidewalk. "Mom, I'm really scared," he said.

She paused and knelt down before him. She took his face in his hands and stared hard into his eyes. "I know you are, Tobin," she said gently. "I'm so sorry this is happening to you. I tried to protect you as best I could."

She pulled him into a tight hug and held him there for there for the longest time. Then she pulled back and stood. "We need to get going. We don't have much time before we have to get off the planet."

An hour later Tobin crouched behind a trash bin near the thrift shop, waiting for his mother to emerge. His ankle was starting to throb. He tried the meditation exercises she showed him, but all they served to do was dull the very edge of the pain. The deep, grinding pain remained.

Jalia emerged from the store a few moments later carrying a bag of clothes. "Put these on," she said.

Tobin started to do as she said until… "Mother, these are girl clothes!"

"The Imperials are looking for a mother and her son," Jalia said. "You'll survive being embarrassed. You won't survive euthanasia. Just put them on."

Tobin was an ordinary boy. He was not above resisting his mother's orders or even fighting with her. But when the magistrate came in and announced his death, he knew so much fear that the minor embarrassment of wearing a dress no longer seemed important. He pulled the clothes on, and then stood patiently as his mother pulled a brunette wig over his own short-cropped hair. She then applied a touch of make-up to his cheeks and lips and leaned back to view her results.

"The miraculous ambiguity of youth," his mother said. "You're as beautiful a girl as you are handsome a boy. This might buy us enough time to get to our contact and get you off planet. How's your ankle?"

"It really hurts."

She knelt down and he could see from her face that it was a bad break. Still, she held it with both hands and the grinding pain faded away not before numbness, but before a heat that bordered on the unbearable. He lost all track of time as she knelt before him. His hand rested on the silky strands of her hair as much for balance as comfort. The heat was more intense than anything he'd felt, but it did not burn him.

"There," Jalia whispered with an exhausted gasp. She did not stand—rather she rocked back and sat on the permacrete. She suddenly looked gaunt and sweaty.

"Mother?"

"Let's just say you are already a more powerful healer than I am," she told him. "But you should at least be able to walk on it. Don't run, for Force's sake, but you should be able to walk now for at least an hour or so."

He put weight on it, and was delighted to find that the deep, grinding pain was gone. It was definitely tender, but it no longer hurt nearly as bad. "Thanks, Mother," he whispered.

"You're welcome. Now, come on. We don't have much time."

"Where are we going?"

"To a sanctuary," she said.


	2. Faith

**Chapter Two: Faith **

Holding hands, Tobin and his mother stepped onto one of the moving sidewalks that crisscrossed the city until they reached a public tram station. They sat waiting for the next tram with a large crowd.

As they did so Tobin felt a tickle in the back of his mind, and a strange compulsion not to look at his mother. He easily shrugged aside the compulsion and noticed from the narrow set of her eyes and the thin line of her lips that she was concentrating on something. This was a skill she had not taught him yet.

The tram came before he had a chance to ask about it, and the two climbed aboard.

Tobin hid his surprise when they disembarked in a tower just a klick from the same school that almost saw his death. "School was out an hour ago, I hope she's back," Jalia said. They entered the tower and took a lift to the housing levels.

When at last they came before the door his mom was looking for, Tobin was desperately trying to figure out what was happening. A moment after Jalia touched the announcer pad, the door opened, and Tobin's own teacher, Soola Daayala, stood expectantly. With a nervous glance up and down the halls around them, she stepped aside and let them enter.

The moment the door closed, she wrapped Tobin in a tight embrace and then stood to face his mother. "I am so sorry for all this," she said with tears in her eyes. "When the magistrate came, I kept praying to the Force that it was for some other purpose, but somehow I knew."

"You alerted me," Jalia said. She pulled Soola into her own embrace. "You saved us both at jeopardy to yourself."

"You are of the Force," Soola said, as if that statement was sufficient to justify any action. "Come, I may be watched here. I don't know if they suspect me of being a Unitarian or not, but we can't be too careful. We must get you to the others."

"Others?" Tobin asked.

"Later," Jalia said. It was more of a promise than a command. Tobin followed, though he found it harder to keep up. His ankle was starting to hurt again—not necessarily with the grinding pain he felt before, but it was definitely hurting.

Soola led them down through the residential tower, very obviously forced herself to take a deep breath and then walked calmly when they left the lift in the underground garage. Jalia took Tobin's hand and the two followed Tobin's teacher until they reached an actual four door enclosed speeder.

Tobin may have been young, but he wasn't so young that he didn't wonder how an educator could afford a speeder. Still, in this case it proved a blessing. He climbed into the back while his mother sat in front, and Soola started the repulsors. The car slid into the air smoothly after the minute it took to navigate the garage, and then they were speeding north away from the capital city.

Tobin knew from his history classes that Nalderaan was colonized three hundred years ago, just a few years after the old Galactic Alliance was defeated once and for all. In fact, the planet traced its birth to the first century of the New Era.

The initial colonization consisted of ex-patriots of a dead world known as Alderaan, a world that was lost in one of the many conflicts caused by the Abnormals. It was primarily human but also had a sizable population of Twi'leks and even a few Zabraks.

What it meant for the world to be so young was that there were still large expanses of wild country on the planet. It was possible to fly for an hour and loose all sight of civilization. This is what Soola did as the sun sank below the Western Mountains. They flew for two hours before they arrived at a lodge made of local wood on the edge of a sparkling lake. When they landed the first moon was already up with the second rising quickly.

"We are the first ones here," Soola announced. "Please, come. I have wanted so very long to bring you and Tobin here, but not like this."

"I understand, Soola," Jalia said.

Tobin started to climb out of the car, but stumbled as his ankle gave out. He landed with a low groan. He felt a hand on his shoulder and saw his mother staring down at him. "I'll help," she said. She did at that—lifting him to his feet and supporting him as he hobbled to the front of the lodge.

The interior of the lodge was a wonder to Tobin. The front half of the building was open, while the back half had two stories. There were pews lining the floor in the open half, enough for at least thirty people. All faced a podium, and in the wall above the podium and above the entrance to the rear rooms was a circle bisected by a half-line. The interior was relatively bare with only a few abstract paintings or works of art. Past the large common room, though, they found a kitchen and a small, state-of-the-art medstation.

Between Soola and Jalia, Tobin managed to climb onto the table. Jalia took a scanner and passed it over his ankle, nodding as it confirmed what the Force had told her. "A nasty break," she whispered. "I was able to reduce the swelling and hold the bone in place, but the power of the healing required was beyond me."

Soola handed her a large needle of clear fluid. Tobin's eyes widened. "What is that?"

"A Sekotan Vong bone sealer," Jalia said. "It's the best on the market. Thank you, Soola. Now Tobin, hold still and use the second meditation on pain."

"Why not a pain killer?" Tobin asked.

"Because of the Force you don't need it and these people may."

Tobin bit back a sharp reply. The second pain meditation was hard to maintain. Still, he took a deep breath, let it out, did it against twice more, and then sank himself into the meditation. He felt the thick needle pierce his skin as if from a distance. He felt the pain, but in an abstract way that kept the pain at a safe distance.

In the depths of his meditation, he felt the biotic agent working to knit his bone together with greater speed and efficacy than even distilled bacta. A small corner of his mind, made analytical by the nature of the meditation, wondered if the effectiveness of Vong medications were why they were all controlled substances in the Empire, and why it was so hard to obtain them.

From a distance he felt the pain lessoning and released himself from the meditation. Soola was watching with avid interest while Jalia merely nodded. "You held it well that time," she noted.

"It would have been pretty bad without."

"The one drawback to Vong medicine," Jalia noted with a wry smile. "They want the patient to feel the pain."

"I've used that before," Soola said. "It does hurt, terribly. It was the Force that let him not feel the pain?"

"I felt it," Tobin said with a shuddering sigh. "The meditation let me put the pain aside so it wouldn't overwhelm my mind."

"Through the Force," Jalia said, "a Jedi can control their own body, including basic responses such as pain and pleasure. Tobin also has a latent healing power which, unfortunately, I don't have."

Soola nodded, eyeing them both with a strange adoration that made Tobin faintly uncomfortable. "When the others come, will you speak with us?" she asked Jalia.

"Of course."

The others, as it turned out, were mostly human. They were adults or teens—no young children. The only other Twi'lek was a young male with orange-red skin. He and Soola sat together on the front pew, while another man named Tam approached Jalia. "I am the padawai of this gathering," he said to Jalia with a bow.

"Jalia S'Artin, Jedi Knight," Jalia responded with a nod.

The man's face lit with an awe-struck glow. "So it is true. We saw on the holonet the attack on the school, but the local magistrates edited out any scene of you using the Force, so we were not sure. With what Soola told us, we prayed, but we have waited for so long…"

"I don't understand," Tobin said. "Mother, what is happening?"

Tam knelt down until he was eye-level with the slightly shorter-than average Tobin. "We are Unitarians, young Force-blessed. We believe in the Unity of all life in the Force, and in the teachings of the Jedi that once served all the peoples of the galaxy before the Empire tried to destroy them."

"But that's illegal," Tobin pointed out.

"It is indeed," Tam said with a nervous laugh. "Which is why our gathering is small, and why our children and spouses stay home. Believing in the Force is not sufficient to earn a death sentence, but it is enough to face years of persecution and imprisonment. But when we finally see the living truth of our faith, how can we not believe? For the Force has given us the chance to meet you."

Tobin took a seat next to Soola for the simple reason that she was the only person he knew, while his mother stood at the front of the common room. "When we came here last year, you welcomed me and gave me the help I needed to avoid the hunters. Without you and the Force, my son and I would have been caught long before this. Thank you all for your help, and your faith. I, like my father and his father and his father before him, am a Jedi. I was Padawan to my father, who was Padawan to his. I wish I could tell you that my knowledge of the ways of the Jedi was complete, but unfortunately much has been lost. I was seventeen when the Empire found my family. My father became one with the Force to give my mother and I time to escape. I lost her shortly after. But with his training and the Force, I was able to escape and live. I had little but my lightsaber and his training to guide my steps."

She told the enraptured audience of her life, of her pregnancy with Tobin and how she had to use the Force to influence the physicians into not giving her son the required blood tests. Finally her story brought them back to Nalderaan.

Tam stood and thanked her. "May we ask questions, Master Jedi?"

Jalia blushed faintly under the title, but nodded with apparent calm. Only then did Tobin realize his mother was as uncomfortable with the adoration of the people as he was.

"What of young Master Tobin's father? From what Sister Soola told us, he was able to hold off several troopers until you arrived to save him. With such power, was his father not also Force-blessed?"

Jalia looked for a long time at Tobin, then back at Tam and the others. "Tobin has no father. I was a virgin when I conceived."

Tobin knew the story, of course. He knew because he had asked. The revelation had an electrifying effect on the others though. He felt a hand on his shoulders and looked to see Soola staring at him with lips parted in awe. Slowly, others in the gathering leaned forward simply to touch them.

"It is the Prophecy of the One, then?" Tam whispered. "The Time of Balance approaches?"

"I don't know anything for sure," Jalia admitted. Her eyes narrowed a little at all the hands touching her son. "But it is possible. Tobin has the highest midi-chlorian count I know of. "

Tam seemed to reach a decision. He reached into his coat and removed a highly decorated metallic cube. Tobin noticed how his mother's eyes widened. "What is that?" he asked.

"This, young Force-blessed, is our most cherished and sacred artifact," the man said. "An ancestor of mine lived on Ossus, the last home of the Jedi. Though he had little Force himself, he was a trusted keeper of their records and relics. When the temple was destroyed the final time, he managed to escape with a few others and this. It is a holocron."

Tobin's mother had never mentioned such a thing. "What does it do?" he asked.

Tam smiled with open elation. "I don't know. All I know is that it is sacred to the Jedi, a learning tool."

He held it out, and Tobin accepted it with an open palm. It was heavy for its size, indicating the metal was solid. He then did what any young Force-strong child with training would do, and extended his senses to examine it with his mind.

The holocron seemed to pop open with a blue light shining from within. Tam reared back while beside Tobin, Soola made a moaning sound. Her hand squeezed his shoulders. Even Jalia approached.

A blue figure appeared over the holocron. It was the figure of an old woman with iron-gray hair held in braided locks. She wore an odd set of brown robes. Her face was deeply lined with experience. "Greetings, Jedi," the figure said in an old but clear voice. "I am Jedi Master Leia Organa Solo. This holocron was given to me as a gift from my brother, Grand Master Luke Skywalker. It is meant to be a tool for future Jedi, both to show you how to excel, and how to avoid. For my children have reached both the heights of excellence in the Force, and the darkest depths of despair. I have loved, lived and suffered. I have both served and ruled. And through these many years I have gained what I hope could be called a grain of wisdom. I now offer that wisdom to you, Jedi."

Tam collapsed to his knees beside the figure, his face rapturous. Tobin, though, stared at the figure with moisture in his eyes. "Hello, Grandmother," he whispered.

The figure seemed to hear and understand. "You are a descendent of mine? Through my son Jacen's daughter Allana of Hapan? Or through my own daughter, Jaina Solo Fel?"

The last name Fel brought the whole room into a tense and terrible silence. Jalia stepped forward and with a wave of her hand closed the holocron. The rest turned and stared at her in confusion. "For your own safety," she said, "there are some secrets you do not wish to know."

Tam's expression cycled through fear, frustration and awe before it settled down to acceptance. "As you say, Master Jedi. In either event, I can see that the holocron has found its rightful place. Take it as our gift to you."

"Thank you," Jalia said. "It is indeed a valuable gift. Even I will learn from it."

Although that was the last time Tobin saw all of the Unitarians together, he and his mother stayed in the lodge for two more weeks to let the tighter security at the spaceports ease up. The Unitarian cell arranged for discreet transportation while also preparing papers for them.

He and his mother spent their evenings studying the holocron. Tobin was astounded at just how human the personality matrix of his penultimate grandmother was. She appeared heart-broken when she learned that Jalia was the last Jedi, and that not only were the Jedi and Sith wiped out, but also all naturally Force-sensitive peoples.

"For a time," Leia told Tobin on their fourth night in the lodge, "my brother Luke was the last Jedi as well. However, he rebuilt the Jedi Order. Perhaps, in time, you can do the same."

"I'm not sure how I can do that when the Empire kills everyone who could be a Jedi the moment they're born, and sometimes even before they're born."

"Do not underestimate the power of the Force," the holocron Leia said. "I have done that before in my life, and quite often I'm amazed and surprised to find the Force overcomes all our doubts. Perhaps you will see in your life time the Force overcome this new threat."

Tobin couldn't help but dream of a world where the Jedi were not despised or reviled. "Maybe," he whispered.

"And now, young Jedi, it is time to practice your meditations," the holocron said. Leia sounded remarkably like his mother sometimes.

At the end of the second week, Soola arrived with a bag of clothes and prosthetics in one hand, and two identity chits in the other. "You are Zabraks," she announced.

An hour later, Tobin stared at himself with a strange feeling of detachment. He was not the creature he saw in the mirror. In fact, in a strange and slightly disturbing way, he found the figure in the mirror to be faintly attractive. A young Zabrak female with beautifully drawn tribal tattoos stood on the other side of the mirror from him, staring with black eyes. Her black hair hung down to her shoulders, and she appeared inquisitive, and nice.

He knew the hair was a wig and the horns were merely attached with skinglue. He knew the eyes were darkened by contacts and the tattoos would come off with a cream he had in his bag. Nonetheless, when he looked in the mirror, the girl that looked out seemed as if she could have been a friend.

He felt very alone at that moment.

"Are you ready?" Where the voice was his mother, the woman standing before him was not. This woman was a Zabrak of startling beauty, her horns protruding from a face oval at the base, but lengthening into the Zabrak horns. She wore a plain pair of brown slacks and a blouse, but she carried herself with grace and beauty.

"I'm ready," Tobin said.

Behind his mother, Soola stood with her hands clasped under her chin. "I wouldn't recognize either of you, and the lodge facial scanner doesn't either."

Jalia nodded. "We can't thank you enough, Soola."

The Twi'lek smiled and unconsciously bobbed her head. "There are so many reasons for us to help you, Jalia. Not just because you are the last Jedi, but because of the blood you carry. We are few, those you support you, but our will is strong and our faith stronger yet."

Jalia hugged Tobin's teacher firmly, and without another word turned to leave. Soola leaned forward to Tobin and hugged him as well. "Remember me, Tobin," she said.

"I will," he promised with all sincerity. He wasn't going to forget anything about his last day on the planet that, once upon a time, was called New Alderaan.

The Imperial customs official scanned their fake IDs with a bored expression. He never even looked at their faces as they passed by. They were merely two more unremarkable faces in a long line of beings arriving or leaving the planet.

Interstellar commerce benefited as much from the Pax Galactica as individual people. Although piracy and smuggling continued, it did so with much less frequency. Every transport with Imperial Citizens carried at least five troopers. Even whole frigates of pirates would reconsider attacking even one of the feared Imperial soldiers.

So, as the other travelers settled into their seats or cabins with a justified sense of security upon the sight of the white-armored soldiers of the Empire, Tobin and Jalia S'Artin stifled an equally justified sense of fear as they settled into their seats.

The limited credits Jalia had accrued on Nalderaan were supplemented by Soola and the other Unitarians, but still were not sufficient to afford them a private cabin. They took seats in a row of ten other travelers, and across the aisle was another row of ten, and across that aisle another such row. There were fifty such rows just on their deck of the interstellar cruiser, and many of the seats were already full. The deck above had private suites, while the deck below provided semi-private facilities for those beings in the standard class deck.

Tobin sat silently beside his mother as the giant transport finally lifted off from the spaceport and soared through the sky. Despite the view out of the large port window showing them ripping through Nalderaan's atmosphere into deep space, he felt nothing at all. In mere minutes they left the last shards of blue behind and outside the window he could see nothing but blackness, punctuated by the stars of the galaxy.

The captain of the ship announced through an intercom that their destination was Gala, and the trip would take twelve hours. An evening meal and a morning meal would be served, and guest facilities were available on the mid deck for those wishing to refresh themselves during their passage.

As soon as the captain's voice faded, the first of many holodramas came on. Tobin settled in to watch. It was one he'd already seen and enjoyed—it detailed the adventures of a heroic trooper captured by Perlemian pirates. The lone trooper spent the movie fighting his way out of the pirate base while saving a beautiful countess.

The servitor droids brought the evening meal out while trays appeared from the back of the seats in front of Tobin and the others. The droids simply handed the covered plates out. Inside was an unidentified meat covered in a brown sauce and vegetables.

He took a bite and tried keep from gagging. Beside him, his mother took a bite and seemed to enjoy it. "You should eat this," she said. "We won't have foliash pheasant like this again until we return to Iridonia."

Tobin stared a moment before he finally understood. The meals were prepared according to species. He leaned over and noticed a human two seats down eating a slice of nerfsteak. The smell alone was enough to make his stomach protest the awfully bitter slab of distaste that filled his plate. Nonetheless, he knew from his mother's example that it wouldn't kill him. He took small bites, and washed it down with… he swooned a little a he realized the drink was wine.

Zabrak imbibed wine with every meal, regardless of age. They were naturally resistant to the inebriating effects.

"Drink slowly," his mother whispered. "I'll help as much as I can."

He nodded and finished his meal as best he could. Eventually, with his stomach full and the wine flushing through his system, he closed his eyes and fell into a deep sleep.

In his sleep, he dreamed of a fairytale. Of a beautiful princess with coppery red hair that hung in curls down her shoulders, and eyes the color of the Southern Seas of Nalderaan. She was trapped in a tower, and she was calling on him as her knight to come to her rescue. Only, no matter how fast he ran, he could never reach the tower.

He woke not to the gentle announcement that they had arrived, but to a frantic scream. His eyes snapped open and he felt his mother's hand on his arm. "Pirates," she hissed.

"Really?" He couldn't help the excited tone in his voice. So much was made of the continuing piracy of the Empire, and the Emperor's ongoing quest to root them out. Unfortunately, space was a very large and there were almost unlimited places for pirates and smugglers to hide.

"Stay in your seat," Jalia ordered. "They're here to rob us only. They won't harm anyone unless we resist."

"Don't we want to fight them?"

"Most certainly not," Jalia hissed quietly while the others around them scrambled impotently in their seats to hide their jewelry. "That would get innocent people killed and blow our cover. Now do nothing."

Tobin turned, and through the viewport he saw a sight right out of the history readers. It was an ancient _Pellaeon_-class Star Destroyer, easily two centuries or more in age, splashed with huge blotches of crimson, blue and white. As old as the ship was, still it dwarfed the transport as its massive hangar bay slid up and swallowed the ship whole.

"Gentle beings, this is the captain. Our ship has been captured by pirates. In the interest of protecting lives, we have elected to surrender without a fight. We urge all passengers to stay in your seats and do not resist. Make a note of all items taken by the pirates and we will assist with insurance claims once we reach our destination safely. Again, please do not resist for the sake of all the passengers."

The five Imperial troopers rushed to the front aisles, but did not move any further. Throughout the ship Tobin heard a loud clang as the ship was forcibly docked. They sat waiting nervously. Tobin continued to crane his neck to see out the port window, but his view was now obscured by the other passengers doing the same thing.

They heard the hiss of a pressurized hatch opening, and a moment later a huge creature stepped out of the serving bay to survey the troopers and the rest of the passengers. He stood easily over two and a half meters high and wore black trousers and a spacer's vest of bright crimson. He had a blaster carbine hanging from each hip with a larger repeater rifle slung diagonally across his back.

Crowning his otherwise bare skull was a ring of short horns. The man was a...

"I am the Zabrak," the man bellowed. "If you resist, I will take you off this ship and show you horrors you cannot imagine. We want money and valuables, not blood. But give us problems, and blood we will take. That especially goes for you, Troopers. I have no doubt you could kill me or those men I bring with me. If one of us is harmed, this whole ship will be vaporized."

One of the Troopers said, "The Captain has informed us of your promise of leniency. So long as no civilians are harmed, we will take no action."

"No, you will remove your blaster and power packs and hand them over," Zabrak said. "And then you will submit to detention. Anything else and you all die."

Eventually the Troopers agreed as a horde of pirates from a multitude of species poured on board, all armed as heavily as their leader. After the long process of disarming and detaining the troopers, the pirates split up, with half going to the private suites above where they would undoubtedly get more valuable booty.

The Zabrak, however, stayed on the main deck surveying the passengers as his men started down the aisle, removing valuables by force if necessary, but by intimidation otherwise.

Jalia rested her hand on Tobin's and watched the pirates approach with narrow eyes. Once again, Tobin felt that odd compulsion not to notice her, but this time he shrugged it away much easier. The pirates, however, weren't able to shrug it off. They took everything from the other passengers on their row, but completely ignored both Tobin and his mother.

Not even the other passengers noticed the oversight.

The Zabrak, however, noticed.

He let his men move on a few more rows before he strolled easily down the aisle and stopped before Jalia. He leaned over and stared at her, his yellow eyes only inches from hers. She returned the stare without flinching.

"You're not invisible," he said, "so I don't know why Chartris missed you."

Further down, the silver-haired Echani pirate turned, startled to discover he had missed a victim.

The Zabrak, however, was not done. He leaned down again until his nose nearly brushed Jalia's ear, and made a show of sniffing. Then he leaned back and rubbed his chin. "You look like a fine Zabrak woman with a promising young daughter. But you don't smell Zabrak. You smell human. And this one is no girl."

Jalia made no effort to stop him as he reached down and plucked off a horn from her head. He then proceeded to pluck all the horns off. Some of his men had already finished their areas and were congregating in the aisle to watch their leader's fun.

"So, we have a human woman and her son pretending to be Zabrak. Chartris, go fetch one of those troopers."

Only then did Jalia show emotion, a tightening of her lips and a narrowing of her eyes. Tobin noticed, as did the Zabrak.

"Don't like the Imperials much, do you woman?" he asked. "Who are you?"

"Sho'taka Sandai," she said.

"A good Zabrak name. Who are you really?"

Jalia said nothing. Another moment later, the Echani returned with one of the detained troopers in tow. "Imperial, look what I found that you did not. This woman pretends to be Zabrak with a daughter. She is human, and her child is a boy-man. What do you think of that?"

With his face hidden behind the infamous trooper armor, Tobin couldn't begin to imagine the expressions going over the trooper's face, but he doubted it was good. When the trooper spoke, his voice came through without filter, but in his normal voice.

"Nalderaan control stated that two Abnormals were detected and presumed dead. It was a woman and her son. Both were sentenced to immediate death."

The Zabrak laughed a huge, guffaw. "Ha, what fun this is! The Zabrak has not laughed like this in much too long. Are you a genetic freak, woman? Tell the Zabrak now."

The trooper suddenly puffed out a breath as an invisible force hit him square in the chest and threw him across the length of the entire liner. The other passengers screamed in terror as the trooper's flailing limbs caught some of them in the heads.

The pirates reacted with predictable zeal, pointing a whole host of weapons directly at Jalia. She did not react to the weapons. Rather, she kept her eyes squarely on the Zabrak. "My name is Jalia S'Artin. I am a Jedi Knight."

Across the ship, passengers stood or rose from their seats to see who muttered the foul, forbidden word. The Zabrak merely studied her more closely. "The last Jedi, I would wager," he said.

"As far as I know," she said.

"And if I killed you now?"

"You and all your men would die in the attempt," Jalia said with absolute confidence.

Tobin sat frozen, his breath coming in ragged gasps. The other pirates stood with their weapons ready, waiting for word from their leader.

The Zabrak continued to stare a moment before rearing his head back in a gut-wrenching laugh that seemed loud enough to damage the ship itself. "I bet we would at that!" he said. "I like you woman! Why waste away here rotting? Come with us. Use that be-cursed power of yours to hit the stinkin' Imperials and live like a queen!"

"My son would come too," Jalia said.

"If he's as handsome as he is pretty, he'll make a fine addition to the crew," Zabrak said. "Come with us now, and be done with these pathetic nerfs!"

She stood, and motioned Tobin to come as well. The two of them followed the Zabrak out of the ship with only Jalia's travel pack to mark the sum total of their personal possessions.

As they reached the main door, the Zabrak directed more of his men to go to the private cabins in the next deck up, and the semi-private cabins one deck below, where the real wealth would be located. He then personally led Jalia and Tobin out of the ship.

Outside the liner they emerged onto the floor of the massive bay of the even larger Star Destroyer. Tobin immediately noticed how filthy the floor was, and how cluttered the bay was. Fighters as new as the Imperial Interceptors to the ancient TIE-Predators lined the floor in the distance. He wasn't sure, but Tobin even thought he saw a real X-wing fighter, an artifact of history so old it belonged in a museum.

The rest of the pirates left the ship perhaps half an hour later, and the captain of the liner resealed its hatches. The Zabrak pulled out a finger-sized com. "Bridge, release the captured liner. When it's clear, blast it. I want nothing left."

"But…" Tobin started to say, when he felt his mother's hand on his shoulders.

The Zabrak noticed. "What, boy, you think we're going to let eye-witnesses and holo-cams ID us? I kept my word. I didn't harm a hair on their heads while we took what we wanted. Instead of suffering, they'll die quick."

"They'll still be dead," Jalia noted.

"Aye, witch, that they will. And good thing for you. That trooper thought you were dead. Now no one will be about to say otherwise. You should thank me."

"I am Jedi," she said. "I can never be thankful for wholesale slaughter. You should know that now, Zabrak. I will help you as the Force allows in payment for shelter, but I will not murder for you. Ever."

"We'll see," the Zabrak growled. "Come, I'll show you off to the rest of the crew."

Tobin looked over his shoulder as the passenger liner sank through the containment fields of the bay into open space. The old Star Destroyer was so large he never felt the shots that killed his fellow passengers, and yet somehow, he knew the exact moment they died.


	3. Living History

**Chapter Three: Living History**

From his reading of history, Tobin knew The _Pellaeon_-class Star Destroyer was first introduced almost four hundred and fifty years ago during the Empire-Alliance War. At the time it was the fiercest war machine ever made. The last version produced was over 1700 meters long, it was among the largest ships ever produced, with ten heavy turbolaser batteries and another ten regular batteries, and four ion cannons. It also sported ten proton torpedo launchers with a cargo capacity to carry four hundred such weapons.

It was, during its operational life, the top predator of the galaxy.

In the centuries that followed, the Empire stopped fighting large-scale wars. The need for overwhelming brute force in a single ship faded. Rebellions were small and quickly put down, or eased over politically. The new Empire was not the old. There were no Tarkin doctrines. The Fel Dynasty was enlightened, and with the establishment of the Imperial Senate, provided the people enough self-determination to avoid even the desire for rebellion.

The last true Star Destroyer was produced two centuries ago, and was decommissioned fifty years later. Now the Empire fielded frigates, corvettes and interdictors in vast numbers, none of which approached the size of the old _Pellaeon_–class ships.

The first thing Tobin learned on his first day as a pirate was that it took a lot of people to make a ship that big and that old continue to function. A lot of people.

"There are almost a hundred thousand of us on this ship," Zabrak said as he led them through the halls. Only one in five lights were lit, giving the hallways a dim, eerie feel. Only the constant stream of traffic prevented Tobin from feeling scared. Rather than frightening, well-armed warriors, he was surprised to see a number of ordinary looking sentients, including humans and every other species he could identify.

"I didn't know the pirate population was that large," Jalia said.

"Empire's a big place," Zabrak said. "Lots of people don't like taking orders from the stinkin' bucket heads. This here's the last remnant of the Alliance. Yeah, I said it. Alliance. We vote on initiatives and actions. Tactical command is mine, but long term decisions affecting the crew get voted on."

"How remarkable," Tobin's mother said with a straight face. "With a ship this large I assume you have to have a command base."

"Maybe we do, maybe not," Zabrak said. "I'm not of a mind to tell you. For all I know, you could be some elaborate set-up, Abnormal or no."

"A sensible precaution," Jalia admitted.

After a maze of passageways and turbolifts, they arrived at what had to be the bridge of the ship. It was a massive gangplank running over a series of lower command pits filled with dozens of control stations.

"Aleusa, look what the Zabrak brought home!" their host roared as he stepped in.

Aleusa proved to be a human woman in her late forties with a hard edge to her jaw and red hair gone prematurely to silver. Rather than make her look old, the silvery-red hair made her even more striking.

"You made a family so quickly?" Aleusa said with a quirky smile. "And here I thought you had eyes only for me."

"Pah, this woman's no more a Zabrak than I'm a Mon Calamari. She's human, and claims to be a Jedi. Trooper aboard the liner said she matched the description of an Abnormal that tried to escape Nalderaan. This girl child is a boy."

"Yes, he is," Aleusa said as she stepped closer to examine their guests. "A Jedi, so you say? Can you prove it? Perhaps do a trick? Rollover and play dead, little Jedi."

The Zabrak laughed, but the laughter faltered when he realized he was floating two meters off the deck. Tobin only realized how loud the bridge had been when it became absolutely, eerily silent. All eyes were turned to the floating Zabrak and his mother, who stared back at Aleusa.

Gently, Zabrak floated back to the deck. "We ordinarily don't perform on demand," Jalia said with a smile as wry as the other woman's had been. "But I thought it would be better to dispense with any doubts. I am a trained Jedi Knight. I am wanted by the Empire, as is my son."

"Who is the boy's father?"

"None of your business."

The whole bridge bristled, but Aleusa merely smiled. "No, I suppose it's not. Zabrak is the general of the pirates aboard this ship. I am more like the president. I was elected by common vote, and will serve until the crew feels I am not fit to serve any longer. While Zabrak makes the military decisions, everything else falls on my shoulders. Now tell me, why should I allow an Abnormal among us?"

"Jedi were at one point considered the most feared and respected warriors and mediators in the galaxy," Jalia said. "Our fall was due to treachery as much as any arrogance on our part."

Aleusa's wry smile turned cold. "Your fall was due to the Empire getting sick of you and your opposing Abnormals wrecking the whole galaxy every time you wanted to wipe each other out. I was educated in the Core Worlds that still remember the Galactic Alliance, even if the memory has been consigned to a deep grave. My education included much the Empire would rather children never learn. I know the names Jedi and Sith, and I also know that almost every galaxy-wide conflict in history was either as a direct result of the Jedi and Sith fighting, or of one side leading the rest of the galaxy to wipe the other out. Trillions upon trillions of innocent sentient beings have been killed in the name of this unholy 'Force' of yours. Do you really blame the rest of the galaxy for wanting you dead?"

For the first time, Tobin thought he saw a note of uncertainty enter his mother's expression. She nodded slowly. "I don't blame them," she finally said. "I watched the Empire murder my father because of what he was. I've been running since I was a teenager. I just don't want to lose my son, and I'm not sure what else to do." She gripped Tobin's shoulder with a painful grasp. "I need help."

Aleusa studied Jalia's face, and then Tobin's. "A little humility can go a long way," she said at last. "Understand this, Jedi. This is our home, our way of life. We are not joining you; you are coming to us as a refugee in need of assistance. You will not judge us or stop us from doing what we have to do to survive. You will perform your duties as best you can, as will your son. And in return you will receive shelter from your enemies as long as we can provide it."

"Thank you," Jalia said. "I will do my best to serve this ship."

"Then you are welcome," Aleusa said. "Klinti, let's find quarters for our new crewmates."

Klinti climbed out of one of the crew pits and Tobin stared, genuinely surprised. She appeared to be a young human female, perhaps in her early to mid teens. Her eyes, however, were covered by a veil that hung from a band around her head to the tip of her nose.

"A Miraluka," Jalia said, also surprised. "I didn't know any survived."

"Like you, I am the last of my kind," Klinti said simply.

"Her family was one of a small band of Miraluka refugees hiding on one of the moons of Iego," Aleusa explained. "We happened to be nearby when the Empire found them. When we intercepted her escape pod and heard her story, we decided to allow her to stay. So at least you won't be the only Abnormals on the ship."

Klinti stepped past Jalia, Tobin and Zabrak and led them back out of the bridge. Zabrak, Tobin noticed, stayed behind with Aleusa.

Once they were back into the dimly lit halls, Tobin said, "I don't understand. What's a Miraluka?"

"An entire race of Abnormals," Klinti said, her voice dark.

"The Miraluka are near-humans who see through the Force," Jalia said. "They are born without eyes, but can see clearly. When the Empire banned Force-users, it signed a death sentence for all naturally Force-sensitive races. The Miraluka, the Dathomiri, Kiffar, Fallanassi and a few others were hunted down and massacred at the same time the Jedi and Sith were killed. In the name of peace, the Empire committed genocide again and again."

Tobin stared at Klinti, his throat tight. "I'm so sorry."

She did not look at him, and yet he somehow felt as if she were watching him. "Thank you," she said.

Eventually they reached their assigned quarters. "You'll have to share a room," Klinti said. "Not all the decks are usable. We've converted as much space to living quarters as we can, but this ship was never designed for long term habitation. It's one of the larger rooms, though. There's a curtain in the ceiling to separate the room if you want. The human-form fresher is shared and down the hall. Females are on the right, males on the left. Toiletries are in the cabinets over your bunks. We serve four meals a day when supplies allow, which is most times. The Zabrak is a good captain and keeps goods coming. Aleusa ensures they flow smoothly. We've only had to go on rations twice in the five years I've been aboard."

"Do you know where we'll be assigned?"

"You'll probably be with Aleusa or the Zabrak," Klinti said. "They may have sounded dismissive, but they are excited about having a Force-user aboard. I can see with it, but never had much other use for it otherwise."

"I see. And Tobin?"

"He'll be assigned to school, of course," Klinti said. "All children are, until they're seventeen. But he'll also have part-time assignments as well."

"School?" Tobin said. He tried to hide his disappointment, but evidently did not do well.

Klinti smiled for the first time. "We're a city in space. There are many children, and we owe it to them to ensure they are educated. No one is required to stay on this ship. Anyone can leave during any port call. Children raised aboard tend to stay aboard, but for those who wish to leave, we ensure they have the means to survive abroad."

"Surprisingly enlightened for pirates," Jalia said.

"Think of us as un-ambitious rebels," Klinti said. "The Empire could find us if they tried hard enough, but we are a lightening rod for the disaffected. As long as we don't threaten the Pax as a whole or start an open insurrection, the Empire is generally tolerant of our existence. We're a place to go for the people the Empire doesn't want."

"Aleusa told you this?" Jalia asked.

Though her face was covered and she had no eyes, Tobin had the distinct impression of a wink. "I'm blind, not foolish. I know how the galaxy works. I'm Aleusa's aide. If you need to contact her, go through me. She and Zabrak get annoyed it people don't go through channels."

"Thank you," Jalia said.

Klinti nodded to both the Jedi and her son, and then stepped from the room.

"So, we're pirates," Jalia said as she surveyed the room. "Any preference on your bunk?"

Tobin shook his head, so Jalia picked the one nearest the door. Tobin sat on the other and began removing the false horns. Without a word, he removed his outer clothes, laid down, and fell into a mentally exhausted sleep.

Tobin was six when he first heard the story. The two lived in a small one-room apartment on a planet whose name Tobin didn't even know at the time. He did not like the little school he went too—the other kids were mean to the lone human among them. But at night, since they could not afford holonet connection fees or any other entertainment, his mother told him stories.

They were not happy stories. Some were tragic and would leave the two of them saddened. But Tobin knew they were important and always listened raptly.

The night Tobin learned about his past was the first night he had ever seen his mother intoxicated. She had received an extra tip from the café where she was working and used the money to purchase a small holoreader for him, and a bottle of Corellian whiskey for herself.

They sat on their large shared mattress, with him snuggled up to her for warmth and her with a glass in her hand, when she suddenly said, "I was just a teenager when I watched my parents—your grandparents—murdered by the Empire because of being Jedi."

Tobin went very still. It was the first time she had told the story of his grandparents, and though he knew it wasn't a happy ending he desperately wanted to hear it. "Will you tell me?"

Jalia snorted and grinned without humor as she drained her third glass. Then she leaned her head back against the wall and her eyes went suddenly distant. "Oh Tobin, where to begin? To a time of shining knights and terrible lords and the wars they waged? Or later, where our story begins? Did your history books ever mention names like Skywalker? Jedi or Sith?"

Tobin shook his head. "Never. What kind of name is Skywalker, anyway?"

"An ancient and honorable one, once upon a time," Jalia said. "The Empire cleansed your curriculum, so you never heard the details. To you history was one long series of brutalities executed by what the Empire termed 'Abnormals'. The truth is at once far more intricate, and in some cases, even worse than what the Empire would have you believe."

A silver cylinder flew across the room from Jalia's carryall. Tobin blinked in surprise—he knew his mother could do things, but she normally was not so open about it. She showed the cylinder to him. "My lightsaber. I finished it right before my father died. I am a Jedi, Tobin. That doesn't mean anything to you, but it will."

"You see, all around us is this wonderful energy, what the Jedi call the Force. Force-sensitives like the Jedi could tap into this energy field and use it to augment our senses, our strengths. Races like the Miraluka can even use it to see where they have no eyes. It gives us power to do things like what I did at the school. However, Jedi were not the only ones who could touch this power. There were a group of Force-sensitives called Sith who also could wield this power, and they were diametrically opposed to everything the Jedi stood for. Over the millennia, the Jedi and Sith clashed in war after war. Empires were born and tumbled under these clashes."

She closed her eyes, as if fighting a flood of memories that she couldn't possibly posses. "The Jedi and Sith are responsible for most of the galaxy-scale wars in history. And it was natural that the rest of civilization would grow tired of it, regardless of whether the Force-sensitives fought for darkness, like the Sith, or fought for light. We were still fighting all the way up to the end.

"Before the formation of the First Empire, there was a prophecy that one would come to bring balance to the Force. The Jedi believed this was a young boy named Anakin Skywalker, who was conceived by the Force alone."

"How is that possible?" Tobin was young, but his classmates were more than happy to share their extensive knowledge of common humanoid reproduction.

Jalia's smile seemed odd to Tobin as she studied her son. "Many things are possible in the Force, Tobin. Those with high affinities for the Force have great numbers of what are called midi-chlorians in our cells. That's how the Empire has been wiping us out for the past few decades. All children are tested, and those who have a sufficiently high enough midi-chlorian count to indicate they could be Force sensitive are killed. There is a genetic link in some cases, and so the Empire thought to wipe the Force out by killing anyone who could touch it. Hundreds of millions of infants have been slaughtered because they had too many midi-chlorians in their blood."

The thought horrified Tobin, but he had little time to dwell on it as his mother continued her story. "Regarding Skywalker, the Sith gained the upper hand in their fight against the Jedi by turning Anakin from the Light to the Dark Side of the Force. From good to evil. The Jedi were almost wiped out. However, Anakin had twin children he never knew about, and the surviving Jedi hid these children away in the hopes that they could revive the Jedi and abolish the Sith. The plan seemed to work. The Sith Master was killed by Anakin himself, who turned back to the light side of the Force to save his son. The First Empire eventually fell and the New Republic was born. His children were Luke Skywalker and Leia Organa Solo."

"Solo?" Tobin asked with a surprised blink.

"Yes, Tobin. As in the Mother of the Empire, Jaina Solo Fel, the matriarch and first Empress of the Fel Dynasty that has ruled the galaxy for these past few hundred years. Jaina was Leia's only daughter. The history books tell you all about her many feats and victories, but they leave out one important fact. Jaina was a Jedi Knight. Because of her, the Fel Dynasty was Force-sensitive. For the first century of the new Empire, Jedi were recruited and even served the Empire as Imperial Knights. The first Emperors were trained to use the Force, and it seemed a balance was struck."

Nothing of what his mother told him appeared in his history books. "What happened?" he asked, utterly enthralled.

"That balance was short-lived," she said sadly. "There was a resurgence of the Sith, and again they tricked the Empire to aid them in defeating the Jedi. Their treachery did not end with the Jedi, though, and they also turned on the Empire. They were eventually defeated, but it took generations. It was finally Emperor Ronan Fel I who defeated the last Sith. But he did more than just that. For you see, unlike his sister Sariah, Ronan I was not Force-sensitive. After observing the chaos and destruction caused by the Sith wars, he declared all Force-sensitives to be a threat to the Empire. The small body of Jedi who survived were hunted down and killed. And he then turned his eyes to his sister."

Tobin sat raptly listening. "He killed her too?"

"He thought he did. Because she was of the Royal blood, he could not politically afford to have her openly killed. Instead, he staged an assassination attempt which he planned to have pinned on a Sith lord. Only, Sariah knew her brother's intent. With the last remaining Jedi knight, an Imperial cousin named Cray Skywalker Cartin, the two managed to flee their rigged shuttle just before it exploded, and they went into hiding.

"In the years that followed, Ronan and his son, Ronan II, did more than just declare the Force to be a threat. They labeled it a disorder and a disease. To be Jedi was not just to be dangerous, but to be an abnormal outcast. It soon expanded to include any individual or group who could touch the Force. The witches of Dathomir were slaughtered from orbit. The Miraluka home world was slagged, as was Kiffar and Kiffu. Not everyone believed the Empire's propaganda at first, of course, but enough did that within two generations it became accepted fact. There were no Jedi, there were no Sith. There were simply Abnormals who were a threat to the stability of the Empire.

"The worst thing about the story, though, was that he was right. Oh, Tobin, I've meditated and even prayed that it not be the case, but after all my studies I can't deny it. The division of Sith and Jedi was the root cause of almost every galaxy-wide conflict we had, short of the Vong invasion. Since the final great purge, the Galaxy hasn't fought a single interplanetary war. Not one." She paused and took a long, shaky breath. "It's as if the Empire really is better off without the Jedi."

"But what happened to Princess Sariah?" Tobin asked.

Jalia smiled and tore her thoughts from their dim future back to the past. "She and Cray went into hiding, and there they stayed. They fled from world to world as the need arose, always hiding their identity. In time they had a son, and even knowing the risks they taught him everything they knew about the Force. And amazingly, he was the most powerful Jedi either had seen. The next generation a single son was born, and he was even more powerful. On it went, each generation getting stronger than the last, until at last a girl was born instead of a son. Her Jedi father taught her the ways of the Force while her mother tried her best to understand. In time, when the girl was in her late teens, the Empire caught up with them and her father and mother both died while buying her time to escape.

"She disappeared, living like a normal person and faking the necessary blood tests. Then one day, she became pregnant. She didn't understand how. She had never been with a man, but there was no denying that she was pregnant. She found out her little boy had the highest midi-chlorian count ever recorded in a single life form, and she realized her son was conceived by the power of the Force itself. And that's when she realized that the old prophecy that one would come to bring balance to the Force was true. Only, it was never intended to be Anakin Skywalker, or if it was, the first attempt failed. The Chosen One of the prophecy is you, Tobin Solo Fel Artin. And for the first time, we are not alone."

Tobin was too young to fully understand what his mother was saying. But he knew what alone mean. "What do you mean?"

"I found a group of people here who worship the Force," Jalia said. "They call themselves Unitarians. And they're going to help us get off this Force-forsaken planet. We're going to a new world with more humans; a world with fresh and living plants and animals. And we are going to have a better life."

Tobin heard the hope in her voice; the first he'd ever heard from her, and nodded to make her wish true. He snuggled closer to her and listened to her heartbeat as she slowly drifted off into an alcohol-inspired sleep.


	4. The Life of a Pirate

**Chapter Four: The Life of a Pirate**

On a ship with over a hundred thousand souls, one would think it would take rumors a long time to get around. However, this was not the case.

When Tobin walked into the former storage bay turned school, every child there knew he was the son of a Jedi. That he was Abnormal.

"Welcome, Tobin," the teacher said. The teacher was a Mon Calamari, and spoke with a gurgle in the back of her throat. "Please take a seat."

The only seat available was front and center of the room. Doing his best to ignore the looks of the other children, who appeared to all be approximately his own age, Tobin took his seat.

"I am Chingal," the Mon Cal said. She handed him a holopad. "Since we are not in a good position to transfer school records, I'll need you to complete these placement tests so we know where to start you. The rest of you, turn your pads on and pull up Integral Calculus, section two."

Immediately Tobin felt a little better, since on Nalderaan integral calculus was a fifth year subject he covered the previous year. He aced it, of course.

The tests started out basic, confirming basic reading and writing skills all sentients were expected to know before they even began formal education, usually from basic education mind imprinting. While the teacher lectured, Tobin did his best to tune the sound out and took the tests.

There were an unending number of tests, and he continued test after test as the day proceeded, breaking only as the class broke for recess or lunch. None of the other students spoke to him, and he found himself in a corner of the make-shift cafeteria, eating alone.

When they returned, he took more tests until the chime announced the school day was over. "Tobin, a moment," Chingal said as the others left. She took the pad from him and motioned him to sit in the archaic metal chair by her equally archaic desk.

"It is going to be difficult for you," she said absently as she began looking over his results. "The stigma of being Abnormal will be difficult to overcome. Klinti suffered as well at first. Just remember that this is an egalitarian regime. Arrogance will not be tolerated; no matter how justified a person may believe that arrogance is."

Tobin ground his teeth and said nothing. He had not exchanged a single word with the teacher, and already she was assuming he was arrogant. Aleusa seemed to think the same of his mother.

Finally, Chingal set the pad down. "Whatever your genetic state, your previous school must have been quite effective. You've scored well out of your age range in every subject except history, which is to be expected as a citizen of the Empire. While I hate to make you stand out even more, I believe we may have to put you on independent study."

"What does that mean?" Tobin asked.

"It means you're about three years ahead of your peers, and I'll neither demand they catch up, nor make you slow down. Nor do I want to put a ten-year-old in a class of teenagers. Don't worry; there are a few others on independent study as well. You'll come to class with the others, but you will work on your own schedule with curriculum I provide. So long as you make satisfactory progress, you'll be given more leeway than the others. If you don't show progress, then we will assume the tests were a fluke and put you in place with your peers. Do you understand?"

"I believe so."

"Good." They turned at the sound of a knock. Klinti stood at the door. Her silver-lined veil caught the overhead lights and flashed like jewels. "Is he done?"

"He is. Another IS student like you, Klinti."

She smiled. "I suspected that might be the case. Come, Tobin, it's time to find you a job."

Tobin joined her and the two walked down the hall. "If you're the president's aide, isn't it a waste of your time leading me around?" Tobin asked.

"Aleusa has lots of aides. And she doesn't really go by president. She's just Aleusa, like the Zabrak is just the Zabrak." She led him unerringly through the halls, and he wondered what it would be like to see with the Force.

"Maybe you'll find out soon," she said.

Tobin's step faltered, but when he saw she did not slow down he sprinted after her. "I didn't say that aloud."

"No, but you thought it loudly. Miraluka are not generally telepathic, but if you shout something with your thoughts there's a good chance I'll hear it. And in your case you project strongly. Perhaps it's because of your genetics, or perhaps training. If your mother is any indication, you probably will be seeing with the Force soon enough."

They turned a corner and emerged in what could only be described as a market. Originally a secondary fighter bay, the open space was lined with store fronts like those on any of a thousand worlds. They passed through the center of the market to a series of offices that were original to the ship.

In the front office of the bay, a large Hutt lounged behind a desk. "Ohhh, Klinti," the massive creature belched. "You come to give me a kiss!"

"Right after you perform that ballet for me, Tagulla."

The Hutt bellowed with laughter. "And you brought me a snack, too! What a fine, tasty-looking thing."

"Don't worry, Tobin, he doesn't eat humans," Klinti said, grinning beneath her veil. "He is the labor master on the ship. He'll assign you to your new job."

"Job, this one? He's even shorter than you, Eyeless one!"

"Not everyone can enjoy being the size of a Hutt, Tagulla."

"Indeed. Now, young one, what do you do?"

"I never had a job before.'

"So? Neither have I. What do you do? Do you aid droids washing sheets? Do you clean or cook? People are cheaper than droids—we do all this ourselves, yes. Do you handle weapons? Do you build things?"

Tobin perked up a little at the thought of building.

"I see," the Hutt said. "A young tinkerer, then?" He reached a flabby arm into a cubical behind him and pulled out a cylinder of metal. "What is this?"

Tobin stepped forward and stared. "It's a repulsor coil, I think," he said. "But its a really old one."

"A tinkerer it is, then," Tagulla said. "Eyeless one, would you have known what this was?"

"Not even if I could see it," Klinti said.

"See!" Tagulla said. "We have need of many tinkerers. This old bucket is falling apart. They don't make parts for centuries-old ships now, do they? You'll be assigned to an apprentice repair team. Your team leader will be Shuut." He turned to Klinti. "Will this one's parent come through me?"

"The Jedi is being assigned directly by Aleusa or Zabrak," Klinti said.

"A pity," Tagulla said. "I understand she is quite a sight."

"I wouldn't know."

The Hutt bellowed laughter again.

That night, Tobin experienced his first communal shower. "Flushing!" a voice warned. No one warned the young boy what that meant, and so he cried out as the water turned viciously hot. He heard snickers from other stalls.

Afterward, he found his mother sitting on her cot, reading from a pad. She looked up and smiled as he walked in wearing a thread-bare bath robe. "I heard you did well on your tests."

He nodded and then pulled the curtain across the room as he dressed. He now had four sets of clothes, all from the market Klinti showed him earlier. Once dressed for bed, he pulled the curtain back again and found his mother in the same position as before, reading.

"What is that?"

"Work," she said. "There are only so many places a ship like this can load supplies. They hit cargo trains and colony ships when they can, but they also have to be able to trade. I never knew there were so many pirate trading posts. There's an entire parallel economy among the pirates. I look forward to seeing the Rings."

She put the pad down and studied him. "Do you have the holocron?"

Tobin nodded.

"Good. We must continue your training."

That night Tobin dreamed of the princess. She was not in a tower. She stood atop a mountain of dead children. Her small, round face was fixed in an expression of horror. "What have we done?' she cried to her knight. "Save me!"

But as with all the other dreams, no matter how hard he ran he could never reach her.

The next morning when Tobin opened the door of their small quarters he was surprised to find two bowls of sweet grains, a roll and a pitcher of blue milk waiting for him. He looked up and down the halls but could neither see nor sense anyone.

He brought the food in. Jalia was getting dressed and eyed it curiously. "It was in front of the door," he explained.

Jalia looked at the food for a long time before smiling. "Look at the grain, Tobin."

Tobin looked and saw that with a knife someone had drawn a crude circle with a half-line bisecting it. "Unitarians?" he guessed.

"There must be a few on the ship," Jalia said. "That's a good thing. Now, let's eat."

Later that day, after a long, boring class, Tobin was surprised to discover his boss was a Chadra-Fan no taller than himself, with two protruding teeth and large eyes set under large round ears, both perfectly suited to the dimly lit ship. "Another youngling!" Shuut said happily when he collected Tobin from Tagulla the Hutt's office. "Come and tinker with me, Youngling!"

He went and tinkered, that day and the next. And the next. It was easy to fall into a routine. School, work and then meditation exercises at night. School was frankly boring. He did his work because there was nothing else to do. The other kids still wouldn't talk to him, and the teacher essentially ignored him for those needing more attention.

Work was much more enjoyable. Chadra-Fans were natural mechanics, it seemed, and if Shuut was any example, were a surprisingly happy and joyful people. Tobin was one of a dozen apprentices of varying ages who worked on Shuut's team, and there more than anywhere, Tobin began to feel as if he were part of a team. The fact that he excelled at fixing things made it that much easier for the others to accept him.

The nights, though, were extraordinary. Now that there was no point in maintaining their secrets, Tobin and his mother trained openly. And every morning they found an offering waiting for them, usually a breakfast cereal and milk although once they found a platter of scrambled pheasant eggs and nausages.

Like everyone on the ship, they had a day off every weekly cycle. They used this time to shop for essentials in the marketplace. Everyone on the ship was paid a "salary" of chits equal to their job performance and time on the ship. The chits could then be used to purchase whatever items the market had to offer. The chits could even be traded in for Imperial credits, though the exchange rate was steep.

"A completely self-enclosed economy complete with currency and exchanges," Jalia said. "How long do you think this ship has been in operation?"

It was a test, Tobin knew. That particular day the two of them were sitting in a little cafe enjoying sandwiches. "I'd say a century," he guessed.

Jalia nodded. "Longer, but it was a good guess. This ship has never ceased to be operational. When it was formally decommissioned, it was purchased by a merchant. After that, it was sold to a smuggler, who then lost it to a pirate. Over those years, the original smuggler's crew became indentured to the ship itself, and over the generations whole families grew up. Children were raised to assume positions. Think of all your tinkerers—they are the future mechanics that will keep the ship running. The Zabrak gained power, but before him were a long line of other pirates."

Tobin found himself looking around at the many beings that inhabited the ship. Unlike Nalderaan, there was no clear majority species. There were humans, but there were also Twi'leks and Tagrutas, Zabrak and Echani. There were Hutts and Rodians, even a few Gamorreans, though they were usually kept under a firm leash by the ship's security.

The security itself was odd. There were no uniforms to set the peace-keepers apart. They moved about with self-assurance and a projection of authority. Whether the civilians simply knew them by face, or because of the way they moved about with a sense of authority, any brief altercations were quickly put down.

"I can't imagine living my whole life here," he said at last.

"It's hard to envision, isn't it?" Jalia too was scanning the crowds. "For the vast majority of beings in the Galaxy, Tobin, they are born, live and die in the same place. Beings are driven by a need for a home, and most often home is what they know. Even if it is not the best place they could hope to find, they remain."

"Why?"

"Fear of the unknown. You would be amazed at how much power fear has over people."

"And you?"

Jalia looked at him closely. "Maybe," she admitted with a wry smile. "Let's head back. It's time to practice your meditations."

It was easy to forget where they were and what they were doing as they got caught up in the daily routine of life on the ship. Until their third weekly cycle aboard, that is.

Shuut and Tobin were working on a troublesome compression coil when the whole ship reverberated with a loud claxon. "Hmm, must have found a new target," Shuut said. "Come, youngling!"

Tobin followed the Chadra-Fan through the bowels of the ship until they heard an occasional searing "_Shrrzzt_" sound. "Turbolasers," Shuut said. "Unusual. Must either be an ambush, or the targets are fighting back. Come!"

They emerged through a service hatch into a turbolaser deck. Through triply-reinforced transparisteel windows they saw an Imperial cargo train hanging dead in space, with two Imperial frigates coming about and firing on the pirates.

"The Zabrak must be brave, or did not see those ships," Shuut said. "Two frigates is a big bite."

"We're in a Star Destroyer," Tobin pointed out.

"A destroyer older than your great-grandparents, youngling!" Shuut said. "She is no more ready for a standing battle than you are. And those frigates have nearly as much firepower even if they are smaller. Come, the energizers will be the first to go if there are any overloads."

Tobin followed his boss as they made for the energizers that diverted a safe and steady flow of power from the hypermatter reactor to the turbolasers. Just as Shuut predicted, one of the energizers was already sparking. The two got to work as the whole ship shuddered under enemy fire.

The battle lasted perhaps twenty minutes before the Zabrak announced through the ship's com that the Imperials had retreated and they were taking aboard the cargo of foodstuffs and mercantile goods. A cheer rose from the crew and Shuut performed an odd little jig. But Tobin had a hard time celebrating.

He felt through the Force the deaths of thousands of people, and realized that the cargo trains also had passengers, and that Zabrak had killed them all.

As easy as it was to become inured to life on the ship, this fact more than any other reminded Tobin that he was living among real pirates who committed real atrocities. As he watched the little Chandra-Fan do his little dance, Tobin felt suddenly very alone.

After his shift ended, he did not go back to his room. Rather, he wondered through the ship until he came to the now abandoned communications deck in the conning tower. The deck had been converted to parts storage, but it still held a small sublevel with windows overlooking the length of the ship.

He paused as he reached it when he saw someone already there. Before he could turn to go, though, he heard Klinti's voice. "It's okay, Tobin. You can come down."

Hesitantly at first, Tobin walked down into the observation area and sat on a step a few paces from her. "At first I tried pretending that the Imperials deserved it," she said.

The site of the battle was long gone. Through the observation window he could see nothing but the swirling blue of hyperspace.

"After all," she continued, "none of them would hesitate to report me and have me killed if I were to walk among them. But then I realized it didn't matter if they were Imperials or not. It didn't even matter if they deserved it. We killed them. We were the killers."

Tobin understood. She was there for the same reason he was. She saw through the Force. She saw the people die in a way no one else aboard the Star Destroyer could. "You look brighter," she said then. She turned and smiled kindly at him from behind her veil. "You're learning a lot."

"Enough to see today."

She nodded and the smile faded. "You don't belong here, Tobin, any more than I do. We're here because there's simply no other place for us to be. Two lost souls in a ship of killers."

The two remained side-by-side until the lights dimmed to indicate the sleep cycle, and then wordlessly returned to their quarters. Jalia stood in their quarters waiting for him, her eyes narrowed and her cheeks flushed. "Where were you?" she demanded.

"With Klinti."

"With Klinti…" she stuttered. "You're only ten. What are you doing spending that much time with a pretty teen-ager after hours?"

At first Tobin didn't realize what his mother was insinuating, then he blushed violently when he did. "We didn't…we just…today hurt us. We, we…just had to get away. I found her there. That's all."

She scanned him, body and soul, and then visibly relaxed. "I'm tired," she said by way of apology. "And angry, Force help me. I told Zabrak not to try that cargo train, but he didn't believe me. What's the point of having a Jedi if they won't listen? He almost got us all killed in an Imperial trap. Any other ship, they would have had us. You're going to be relieved of school tomorrow for repair duty. All day, I'm told. And the day after too, likely."

Tobin sat down on his cot. "Does it get any easier watching people die?"

Jalia froze. "That sensitive, already?" she whispered. She sat down beside him, and in a rare gesture put her arm around his shoulder. "There was a legend about the son of Luke Skywalker. They said Ben was so sensitive to the Force that as a child he cried when he felt the insects dying. You burn so bright, I sometimes forget that with brute power comes heightened senses. I'm sorry you felt what you did today." She hugged him close. "It does not get easier. If it ever does, then something is very wrong. Remember that. Death should always be hard."

He did not dream of the princess that night. Instead, he dreamed of a barren wasteland filled with old, decayed ruins, and a dark man waiting for him with a vicious smile.


	5. Pride and Prejudice

**Chapter Five: Pride and Prejudice**

Three months after becoming pirates, Jalia announced to Tobin that the time for meditation exercises was over. "It's time to start saber training," she said.

Since the main docking bay was closed when not in use and was otherwise the largest empty space on the ship, this was where Jalia led her son. The cavernous hall was dimly lit to save energy, but provided a four hundred square meters of relatively open space to work.

"Run with me," Jalia said.

Tobin wondered what running had to do with saber training, but said nothing. Instead, he ran with her. In just a few minutes he fought for air, gasping while his mother was not even breathing hard. She took pity on him and slowed. "Your first lesson," she said. "Physical training is as important as power in the Force. Get attuned to your body, and it will aid you in getting attuned to the Force. And then when your body is ready, I'll show you how to use the Force to replenish yourself."

"I could use some of that now."

"But then you would never know just what you can accomplish on your own," Jalia said. "The Jedi of old grew dependent on the Force and never excelled as people. That will not happen to you. Learn to be a man first, and then harness the Force second. Now, come on. More running."

Running turned to other exercises, and Tobin at times hated his mother with a passion.

The soreness passed after a few days, though, and he began to enjoy windows of euphoria while he worked out.

Weeks bled by into months. Four more times the ship attacked liners or cargo ships, and four more times Tobin found himself sitting alone with Klinti in the old communications deck afterward. As his training advanced, the pain from the deaths of innocents grew sharper, while at the same time his ability to bear it seemed to increase. He wasn't getting used to death, he was simply growing stronger.

One day as he walked into his room, he was surprised to find a box on his cot wrapped in red ribbon. His mother sat on her cot watching expectantly. "Happy Life Day," she said. "You're eleven today."

Without a set planetary calendar to follow, Tobin had lost all track of time. He sat down, excited, and opened the box. He was hoping for a nice shirt, or maybe a holodrama to watch. He was not expecting a pile of mechanical parts and a small box.

He stilled his disappointment, though, as he examined the parts. One of them was a crystal, another was a cylindrical shell about a few inches shorter than his forearm. He looked up, surprised. "A lightsaber?"

"It is a test of a Jedi to make their own blade. I don't expect you to finish it in a day. Or even a week or month. I took nine months to make mine, and you don't have a lot of free time. But I want you to start. Use your holocron to learn how to make the lightsaber."

That night, after toiling on his lightsaber for a few hours, Tobin once more dreamed of huge stone moments in the valleys of a barren world. A deep male voice told him it was nearly time.

Two days after Tobin turned twelve and three months after he completed his lightsaber with the help of the ghost of Leia Organa Solo, Chingal pulled him aside after class and sat him down. "You're done," she said simply.

"I'm sorry?" Tobin asked.

"You've finished the entire curriculum. Anything more would require you to attend university, and I'm sure you can appreciate how unlikely that is. You are very young, but there is nothing left I have to teach you. I've reported this to your mother and Aleusa, and you are now excused from any future schooling."

When he reported to Shuut afterward, the Chadra-Fan did a little jig. "Now I have you to myself! Hah. Mine, mine, mine!"

The Jedi training continued, of course. Now that he had a functioning lightsaber, he and his mother began sparring practice in the bay when their duties allowed. Occasionally, he would sense eyes watching them. On those occasions, they would stop by mutual consent and leave the bay. They both felt something ominous in the Force when those eyes watched them.

Tobin grew taller and stronger with age, as did both his skills in the Force and his odd dreams. He remembered clearly one day he stepped past his mother and realized that he was nearly as tall as she was.

The dreams continued as well, ranging from nightmarish fights against shadowy figures to a sense of anticipation and a voice telling him it was nearly time. Sometimes he saw the fairytale princess. Sometimes he saw oceans of blood and mountains of bodies. He woke from these dreams exhausted, and yet somehow exhilarated.

He experienced other changes as well. When he turned thirteen, Chuut decided he was good enough and gave him his own team of children, many of whom were older. The oldest of his team, a Chiss boy named Haast, immediately challenged his leadership of the team.

Tobin showed great restraint and even helped the other boy up off the ground. Then he used the meager pay he received as a repair team leader and bought all of them spicemeats from the market. After that, there was no question as to who was in charge of the team.

It was two months after his thirteenth birthday that the donor of their breakfasts made an appearance.

Neither Tobin nor his mother knew the woman. She was a Togruta with tiny, dark eyes set in a colorful face with two white montrols rising above her face and two silver-laced lekku hanging about her shoulders.

In her arms she carried a little baby that had blue skin, stubs instead of montrals and plain, un-scaled lekku.

"Please," the woman asked as she stared at the two Jedi. "My baby is sick and I don't have enough chits for the med droids."

Jalia stuck her head out of the room and looked up and down the corridor before pulling the woman in. "I'm unsure what we can do," Jalia said quickly, "but we'll do our best. The child is a hybrid?"

"Her father is Twi'lek," the woman said.

They placed the baby on Jalia's cot and as the woman unwrapped her, Tobin noted the painfully distended belly. "She has not eaten for two days," the woman said. "She cries all night."

Jalia placed a hand on the child, and then shook her head. "I'm sorry," she said. "I can feel there is something wrong, but my skill is limited to bone injuries."

"Let me try," Tobin asked.

Both women looked to Tobin—the Togruta with hope, Jalia with concern. "Tobin…"

"You've said I…"

Jalia cut him off with a look at the woman, and then sighed. "It is a Jedi's duty to help those in need," she finally said. "Okay, Tobin. Take a look and tell me what you feel."

The women moved aside as Tobin gently placed a hand on the child's stomach. The baby looked at him with two black eyes and started whimpering.

Through the Force, he could feel instantly what was wrong. The problem was his limited understanding of physiology, especially the physiology of a cross-species child. There was a reason why cross-species mating was discouraged. Children from such unions were often sickly and even more often unable to have children of their own.

"There's a blockage," he said at last. Though he didn't understand the baby's body, he knew enough to risk a guess. "I think it's in her intestines. Something is blocking the passage."

"Can you dislodge it?"

Tobin closed his eyes and concentrated on the sense of wrongness. It felt like a rock had grown into the organ, and waste was backed up almost into the stomach. The block was hardened, but he began to push it through.

The baby cried in pain and tried to writhe away from his hand. "Hold her," he said. "I know it hurts. I'm sorry. But I have to get the block moving."

Since moving the whole block hurt the child, and would continue to do damage as it progressed through to her rectum, he concentrated more on trying to break it. He was terrified that if he broke it too hard it would perforate the lining of her intestines, but he couldn't have it go through the intestinal tract if it did the same later.

He envisioned an envelope of Force power around the blockage and actually pushed the intestinal walls even further out. He knew it was hurting the little girl, who was crying out for her mother piteously. Still, now that he had a cushion to work with, he exerted more power into his efforts.

The rock of hardened feces broke in half. Still, it was too large. He broke it again and again until he was satisfied. He let the Force bubble collapse and instantly felt the bowel moving.

"We have about a minute to get her to a fresher," he said.

The two women's eyes widened as they rushed the baby girl to the little fresher the suite had. It was a toilet and a sink only, but in this case that was enough. The little girl screamed as her mother tore the diaper off.

The bowel movement shot out like a fire sprayer. The smell was rancid, enough to make Tobin's stomach twinge. But it was coming out. "Is the blood normal?" the mother asked in horror.

"It should go away," Tobin said. "There was a block that was cutting her a little inside, but that was all I sensed was wrong. Look, it's fresh blood."

After almost twenty minutes, the voiding ceased. They used the sink to clean the poor, dehydrated baby up. "She'll need water and an electrolyte infusion," Jalia said, once more in an area she had some familiarity with. "And most likely a fiber dietary supplement. We don't want this happening again."

The woman looked at the baby, which after being cleaned had fallen into a deep, relieved sleep, and wept softly. She turned to Tobin and bowed from the waste. "Thank you, Force-blessed."

"You're welcome," he said.

"It would be better," Jalia said, "if the Zabrak or Aleusa were not to know of this."

The woman nodded. "They will not." With that, she turned and left.

The next morning their breakfast waited for them just outside the door, only this time it was accompanied by two pieces of simple gold jewelry.

They were Unitarian necklaces, a simple chain with the symbol for the sect in a simple hand-wrought gold pendant. Jalia took one of them and viewed it with obvious discomfort. She slipped it into her robe.

"I'll see you this evening," she said after she ate a few bites and left.

Tobin waited until the door closed and took the second necklace. Though he could not say exactly why, he slipped the chain over his head. He then hid it under his shirt before he too left to begin his workshift.

Even if his life did improve in some aspects, Tobin could not escape the circumstances in which he lived. After every engagement with Imperial forces or innocent civilians, he still found himself retreating to the communications deck, and always he would find Klinti there waiting.

As the months and then years slipped by, he began to notice things about Klinti that previously weren't important. He noticed that under her veil her nose was narrow, petite and perfectly formed. He noticed that her lips were naturally red without the need for cosmetics. He noticed that her hair also had a crimson highlight to them, but only in the proper light and only when she wore the silver veil without the accompanying head cover.

He noticed the swells and curves of her body under the loose clothes she wore, and began to understand why his mother sometimes expressed concern about their friendship.

And yet, he knew that she only saw him as boy. At almost twenty herself, she was as unreachable to him as the stars themselves, even if they spent hours within touching distance.

However, two weeks short of his fourteenth birthday, things began to unravel quickly.

The claxons announced the ship was entering combat. Once more Tobin gathered his team as they ran to ensure the turbolasers would survive the battle. Through the transparisteel he saw not a liner or a cargo train, but a massive colony ship.

The ship was lightly armed, but had a squadron of fighters that swarmed toward the even larger Star Destroyer.

In most engagements, the pirates had little need of fighters, but they had them. Aside from one or two modern TIE Interceptors, the pirate fighters were a motley assortment of old TIE-Predators and Uglies—ships built of a variety of different components. These now emerged from the fighter bays of the destroyer and engaged the colony's defenders.

Tobin did his best to keep his mind on his work, but he couldn't shake the feeling that he was on the wrong side of the conflict. Eventually, after suffering heavy losses, the last defending fighter was destroyed. Five old assault shuttles boarded the colony ship.

Through the Force, Tobin could feel his mother among the shuttles, and knew she was fighting her own doubts. When the lives started fading one by one and the pain of the innocent victims spiked in the Force, Tobin straightened from his task. His mother's outrage burned so bright he could almost see it.

Eventually the assault shuttles returned. A moment later all of the colony shuttles also launched and came with the first craft, piloted by pirates and undoubtedly loaded down with supplies. More shuttles flew back out, forming a supply line as the well-stocked colony cruiser was divested of all its supplies.

Finally, when he had everything he wanted, Zabrak ordered the colony cruiser destroyed.

After his duty shift ended, Tobin beat Klinti to the deck and covered his face with his hands to try and center himself. Fifty thousand people died in a second under the Zabrak's unremorseful orders. The whole ship considered the attack a blazing success with the sheer amount of food stuffs and items the colony ship was carrying. The main market was alight with a celebration. However, the people of the ship were also angered over the loss of some of their fighters. No one but he seemed to care that fifty thousand good people just died.

He felt a hand on his shoulder and only then realized he had tears in his eyes. He looked up as Klinti sat down beside him. Her veil rustled with her movement, and her body felt warm against the chill of the rest of the room.

"I wish I could weep," she said simply. Her voice shook.

Tobin looked away out into the hyperspace tunnel. "The worst part is how little anyone cares," Tobin said with a sob. "There were children on that ship. Husbands and wives just wanting to start anew. Whole families wiped out with a single order. And before that—I think Zabrak tortured some of them."

"I know he did," Klinti said in a hollow voice. "They resisted, and he lost half a dozen fighters. He went into a rage and killed anyone who was armed, and then he killed their families. I've been watching it for seven years now."

"How do you cope?"

"Lately?" She smiled gently. "I cope by being with you."

Tobin's heart skipped a beat, then resumed faster than normal. It was at that moment that the realization which had been growing in him over the years crystallized into understanding. Klinti was beautiful, perhaps the only beautiful person in his life besides his own mother. "I wish I were older," he whispered.

"You will be in time, don't worry," she said. Her smile thinned. "Tobin, I never told you this, but because of the way we Miraluka see, sometimes we see more than just what's around us. Sometimes we see things that haven't happened yet. Last night I saw you and your mother in danger. From us. And after the battle, I begin to understand why. Aleusa and Zabrak are very angry with her. You do have some friends on board, but we're not strong enough to stand up to those two."

Tobin took a deep breath. "You're a Unitarian?"

"Makes sense, all things considered, don't you think?" Klinti said with a wry smile.

Tobin nodded. "Mother shouldn't have gone over there. I could feel her anger. I don't know if she did anything, but she's as angry as the pirates are." He turned to her. "Come with us!" he said urgently.

She smiled sadly. "As much as my heart longs to, I know I cannot. I must stay here for now."

"But…" He could not find the words at first. When they came at last, they did so in a rush. "You're my best friend. The best friend I've ever had. I don't want to lose you."

Klinti remained still for the longest time. Then she slowly reached up, and removed her veil. Tobin watched in silence, absorbing every aspect of her face. Her eyes were not pits so much as depressions, with a black line tattooed across her face where her eyes would have been. But every other aspect of her face was absolutely… "Beautiful."

"You are too, Tobin. In time, if you had stayed, we could have been more as you aged. But that is not our fate. At least not as far as I can see." She leaned forward and gently caressed his lips with hers. The sensation was like an electric shock running through his body. She leaned back, and pulled the veil down.

"Be careful," she said. "Be well." She then stood, and left Tobin alone to the void of hyperspace.

When he returned to their quarters, he found his mother pacing. Her face was flushed with a rage he had never seen. "At last," she snapped when he walked in. "Have a nice date?"

He paused at the angry sneer in her voice. "Klinti warned us things weren't safe for us."

"Brilliant deduction," she said. Then she stopped and hugged herself. "We are in danger," she said suddenly. "I…I acted rashly." She collapsed onto her cot and lowered her head. "The bastard was about to kill a child in front of his parents because the father wouldn't give him a trinket. I stopped him."

Tobin stood, waiting.

"The worst part was the boy died anyway," Jalia said. For the first time in his life, Tobin saw moisture in his mother's eyes as she surged to her feet and slammed a fist against a wall. "I can't do this anymore," she cried.

For some reason, Tobin remembered his odd dreams. "Then it's time to go," he said.

His mother straightened and turned to stare at him. "What did you say?"

"I've been having a dream. A man is telling me it's almost time to go to him. I see ruins and a dead world, and a voice telling me to come."

Jalia hugged herself again and visibly shuddered. "It can't be time already."

"You understand what the dream means?"

"It is an agreement I made for help, years ago. But it was suppose to happen much later. When you were fourteen…." She stopped, staring with jaws agape. "By the Force, how blind I've become. You're nearly there, aren't you? It is almost time."

Suddenly Tobin felt a darkness nearby; a sense of burning anger. Jalia felt it too. "They're coming for us," she said urgently. "Grab everything you can for both of us." She lit her lightsaber and burned a hole through the ceiling following the outlines of a metal plate. Rather than let the plate fall, she levitated it with the Force back up and through the hole to expose the narrow service crawlway between decks.

By then Tobin had gathered their clothes and the holocron, and what food they had. His mother leaped easily into the crawlway, and Tobin did the same, surprised at the ease of it after almost four years of Force training.

"Where are we going?" Tobin asked.

"One of the colony shuttles," Jalia said. "They're faster and better shielded than anything the Zabrak has. They also have emergency stores on them. Do you think you could disable the aft and starboard turbolaser batteries?"

"Anyone could if they sneezed hard enough," Tobin said. "Shuut and I have to work hard just to ensure they don't blow up every time they're fired. A lightsaber to the energizer cable junction should do it."

Jalia nodded. They paused in the crawl way and Jalia fitted the metal plate back in the hole. Using the long edge of the blade, she soldered the plate in place enough to hopefully avoid detection.

They both knew the ship as well as anyone aboard. Tobin knew it better than most, having crawled through many of the service passages. He led his mother through the maze of narrow, low-ceiling passageways and down manual ladders. Eventually, they heard angry voices echoing through the passages and knew that their hunters realized they were not where they were supposed to be.

Eventually they reached the turbolaser deck. Only two gunners were on duty, and both were sound asleep. Tobin darted out and used his new lightsaber to slash at the bundle of exposed cables that ran from the energizers to the actual turbolasers before ducking back into the wall. The gunners came awake with snorts and grunts and scanned the deck, but saw nothing.

The aft battery deck had a repair squad on it. Tobin saw they had the cables open and were working on them. "It'll take them three hours to put those back together," he told his mother.

She nodded, and they continued on toward the shuttle bay.

When they reached the bay, they both jumped down from an air vent behind a stack of crates and surveyed the possibilities.

The sheer amount of bounty taken from the colony ship ensured that unloading and stocking would take another day, possibly two. A full fifty pirates and the handful of their valuable droids were moving the goods, mostly colony supplies and food stuffs. Jalia pointed to one shuttle in particular that stood open and mostly empty. It had four fixed laser cannon turrets on the sides and just beneath the canopy, and evidence of a small shield generator and hyperdrive unit.

"That's our ship," she said. She closed her eyes and Tobin felt her reaching out toward the pirates with the Force. Though there was no sound, all of them stopped what they were doing and straightened from their tasks. Then they started running toward the far access hatch across the bay.

"They think there's a fire. It won't last long. Let's go!"

She burst into motion, drawing on the Force to speed her on her way. Tobin did the same, and together they streaked across the bay faster than any normal human could have followed.

The pirates just realized there was no fire when the shuttle doors closed and the craft lifted off the deck. They ran back toward the shuttle, just as Zabrak and Aleusa emerged on the other side of the back with a large squad of armed pirates.

Jalia did not hesitate. Without a look to either side she shoved the accelerator slide and sent the shuttle soaring through the atmospheric shields of the bay. They emerged on the starboard side of the ship and quickly turned. "Set these coordinates," she said as she fed him the numbers from memory.

Tobin had never piloted or even navigated a ship, but after four years of service as a repair technician, he knew navicomps better than even his mother. He fed the coordinates in. "It's the middle of nowhere."

"I know. We can't afford to let them trace our true trajectory."

Suddenly the holocom unit screeched. "Jalia, you're stealing our property," Aleusa told them. "Return it, now."

"That would make it a lot easier to kill us, wouldn't it?" Jalia said.

The civilian pirate leader snarled. "Klinti told your brat, didn't she?"

"Klinti said nothing," Jalia snarled. "I am Jedi. I could feel your treachery before you even decided to act on it."

"My treachery? You interfered with an operation you ungrateful sow!"

"You murdered innocent women and children," Jalia said. "Again and again. You're not pirates. You're murderers." She took a deep breath to calm herself. "For providing a home these past four years, I thank you. I truly do. But we couldn't continue to stand by while you commit atrocities even if you wanted us to stay, and I would never stand by to let you kill us. Consider this shuttle as payment for my services. We haven't taken anything else."

In the background behind Aleusa, Tobin could hear the Zabrak yelling angrily about the main turbolasers being unavailable.

"We won't forget this, Jalia," Aleusa said dangerously.

"I know," Jalia said. "I am sorry, Aleusa. I know you think you're doing what's best for your people. But you have to see that you are so much worse than anything in the Empire. I hope we don't meet again."

"You had better pray not," Aleusa said. "If we do, you will die."

The connection ended. "We're ready to go to hyperspace," Tobin said.

Jalia nodded, and without waiting another moment she pushed the hyperspace lever forward. The stars elongated and began to spin around them as the shuttle leaped away from Zabrak, Aleusa, Klinti and their home for the past four years.


	6. Into The Darkness

**Chapter Six: Into Darkness**

After three short jumps in different directions, Jalia gave Tobin a new set of coordinates. Tobin was surprised when the navicomp kicked the coordinates out as invalid, but his mother insisted that he override it. He did so, and two days later the shuttle arrived at the invalid coordinates.

Tobin stared in shock at the world that should not have been there.

Jalia nodded to herself as she felt his swirling confusion. "There are some worlds so steeped in the Force the Empire erased them from the records or slagged them into glass. The old Jedi home world of Ossus was obliterated. Yavin IV was reduced to ash. Ruusan was actually destroyed and reduced to an asteroid belt. But this world they did not even want to approach. After the Empire extinguished the Force users, they erased this world from all known databanks. It ceased to exist."

"What world is it?"

"Korriban, the home world of the Sith."

Tobin felt his mouth go dry as his mother brought the shuttle into an atmospheric insertion trajectory. The thin atmosphere of the planet bounced off the shuttle's shields, forming a light plasma until they punched through and coasted toward the barren surface.

Even though the world looked dead, in the Force Tobin could feel life thriving there, but a dark and twisted life. The place thrummed with darkness.

"It is a place of evil," Jalia said. "Through the ages, every Sith had to make a pilgrimage here. Most with recoverable bodies are entombed here, even those who are not often have monuments. Do not wander alone here, my son. Stay with me at all times."

"But why are we here?"

"An agreement I made," was all she would say.

As they came closer to the surface Tobin could see the ruins from right out his dreams. Broken obelisks still rose high into the air amidst the shattered remnants of their own peaks. Stunted pyramidal structures rose from almost every valley, while in some valleys there were chasms dropping away into the deepest shadow.

The shuttle came about and landed in what looked like an ancient crater that had been modified into a landing pad. Even after they landed, Jalia did nothing at first. Instead, she remained in her seat staring. "There is no emotion," she whispered. "There is only peace."

She stood, and Tobin followed. The two left the shuttle together and stopped at the edge of the pad. Ahead of them rose a forty-foot high stone structure with what appeared to be a ramp leading down below the surface. She stepped off the ramp but motioned Tobin to stay where he was. After a few more steps she stopped and waited.

The attack came without even a second's warning. One moment she stood patiently, the next a figure in black bore down on her with a shimmering red lightsaber.

Even with the speed of the attack, though, Jalia responded with equal quickness. She somersaulted clear of the attack and had her lightsaber free and lit before she even landed. The attacker stilled a moment, and Tobin got his first look.

The figure had a head of pure white hair and silvery brows set in a narrow, predatory face. The pale skin was streaked by black tattoos. He appeared to be Echani, or a human-Echani mix.

He was grinning now at Jalia, but there was no humor in the expression. Rather, it was an angry look. He launched to the attack, moving faster than Tobin could follow. Amazingly, his mother surged forward with equal speed. What followed was a spectacle on the edge of Tobin's belief.

Lighting poured from the Sith's hands, and was just as easily deflected away. Blocks of stone larger than the shuttle flew from their foundations toward each of the opponents like projectile weapons, only to be shunted aside or in some cases pushed back altogether. The two moved in a deadly dance with incredible speed and grace, filling the valley with the sound of their clashing sabers. This was history itself—a Jedi Knight and Sith lord fighting for their…what were they….?

Tobin felt his cheeks flush with a sense of anger and disbelief. The fighting had ended, and instead of striking one or the other down, the Sith and the Jedi Knight stood stock still in the middle of the crater. The dark lord's arm was around Jalia's waist as he leaned down and…they were kissing? Not just kissing, but REALLY kissing in a way that made Tobin's head hurt and his stomach ache.

At last they parted for air. In a deep voice, the Sith laughed. "I have missed having a worthy opponent," he said.

"Is that what you call it?" Jalia said. She was not smiling. He could feel emotions boiling off her, but without personal experience could not identify the complex maelstrom his mother felt just then.

They both deactivated their sabers, and only then did Jalia look at her son. "Come here, Tobin."

Tobin stepped off the platform as if in a dream. He stopped beside his mother and turned to stare up at the taller, terrifying Sith. "Tobin, this is Darth Valus, Dark Lord of the Sith. Like us, he is the last of his kind. Valus, this is my son, Tobin Solo Fel Artin."

Valus put his right fist into the flat palm of his left hand, and then bowed. "An honor to meet you, young Tobin." He sniffed. "You stink of the Light."

"He has begun his training. He is of the Light."

Valus looked at Jalia, then back at Tobin. "We'll have to fix that, then, won't we?" His grin was more terrifying than any grimace.

After their shuttle was secreted away into one of the many caverns dotting the landscape, Tobin joined the Jedi and Sith in a descent into the underworld of the Sith home world. It felt as if he were walking slowly into a land of the dead.

The walls themselves seemed to crawl, and everywhere he looked evil faces stared at him from reliefs and murals in the walls. Statues seemed to follow him with recessed eyes, and everywhere around him he felt hostility.

"They don't like you being here," Valus noted. His voice was shockingly loud in the absolute silence of the Sith catacombs.

"Who?" Tobin asked.

"The Sith," Valus said. "You Jedi, when you die you become one with the Force. You allow your souls to fade into obscurity. We Sith cling to our souls jealously and never let them fade. They all rest here, all the true Sith. But worry not—they don't like me either."

"Why is that?" Tobin asked.

"I failed to find an apprentice," Valus admitted with a shrug. He glanced briefly at Jalia. "I searched as far and wide as I dared, and could not find a single living Force-sensitive but your mother. The Empire's programs have been effective. So, I am the last Sith. Your mother should have been the last Jedi. But it seems the Force was not done with life in this galaxy after all. It played a trick on us all." He turned and grinned at Tobin while his mother watched on. "It made you."

They reached a cavernous room lined with huge statutes of dark figures with faces hidden deep in their hoods. "Just one of many tombs," Valus said. "This one I call home."

Indeed, a large tent rose from the center of the cavern right behind a fire. Around them, archaic torches and a single open skylight above provided the only illumination. "The tent is large enough for ten, so there will be room," Valus said. "I have provisions enough to last for years and a ship and credits if we need more."

"I still don't understand," Tobin said as they settled around the fire. "Mother, why are we here? I thought the Jedi and Sith were enemies. And yet he…kissed you."

Valus laughed harshly. Jalia bowed her head a little. "Tobin, it's hard to explain…"

"We're lonely," Valus said abruptly. "We're the last of our kind. No one else in this whole galaxy understands. But your mother, she understands me. And I understand her. We are enemies in philosophy, but even we realize the futility of being enemies in fact. When we first met, we realized this quickly."

Tobin felt his cheeks flaring. "You're not my father, are you?"

"Tobin," his mother said, scandalized.

Valus merely chuckled. "No, lad. You were already born when we met. I wish that I was and could raise you as proper Sith. But no. Your mother should have told you—you were born by parthenogenesis. Your mother conceived of you by the power of the Force alone, and if I remember correctly upon her learning of it, she was as surprised as you when you first learned the truth."

"I was infertile, Tobin," Jalia explained. "I should not have been able to conceive at all. So no, Valus is not your father. You are a child of the Force. I did not even meet Valus until after your birth."

"A child of the Prophecy," Valus said. At Tobin's expression, Valus grinned. "Yes, I know the prophecy too. None knows the actual words any more. Only that during a time of great despair a chosen one would come to bring balance to the Force."

"There's only two of you," Tobin said. "That's about as balanced as can be."

"No," Jalia. "I will be the last Jedi, Tobin. And Valus will be the last Sith. I've taught you Jedi arts, but you will never be Jedi."

"I will teach you Sith arts," Valus continued, "but you will never be Sith."

"I don't understand."

"You're going to be neither, and both," Jalia said. "You are going to be the Unifying Force incarnate. After you, there will not be Jedi. There will not be Sith. The time for conflict within the Force has ended. If the Force is to ever emerge among the societies of the galaxy, it must do so with a single set of servants. It must be balanced."

"And we begin that on the morrow," Valus said, a hint of menace in his voice. "Will you be ready?"

Tobin nodded as the question echoed in his mind.

Tobin thought he was ready. He was wrong.

Training with a Dark Lord of the Sith was nothing like the training he experienced with his mother. His sleep was interrupted by a stabbing darkness through his dreams, and the Force itself woke him in warning. He opened his eyes to see a shadow standing over him with a red saber.

Valus said nothing as he swung down. The screaming of the Force convinced Tobin that there would be no quarter, that if he did not move he would die. The young man rolled away as fast as he could and searched desperately for his lightsaber.

He finally saw it, hanging from Valus's belt.

The Sith deactivated his blade. "First lesson. Last lesson. Never loose your blade. Now, take it from me."

Nearby, Tobin sensed his mother stirring, but he knew from the previous night that she would not interfere. He held out his hand and summoned the blade, but then felt himself thrown back as Valus countered his pull.

"Try again," he said in a barking growl. "I will never give it to you, boy. Take it, or lose it!"

Tobin pulled again, and once more was thrown to the dusty ground for his trouble. He tried rushing Valus, but learned that was an even more painful option that Force-pulling, when he ended up tossed through the air like a doll. He tried levitating objects toward the Sith, who waved the attempts off with a contemptuous snort.

Finally, Tobin quit. "I can't beat you."

"Then you don't deserve the blade," Valus said. He turned toward Jalia. "Your whelp is weak. He can't even take the blade from me. At least you put up a fight last night, even if I beat you!"

In his mind an alien image struck through his unprepared mental shields, and it made his blood boil. An image of his mother, nude, looking up at him with half-lidded eyes and parted lips. "Valus!" Jalia said, outraged.

Her rage was nothing. With a roar, Tobin launched himself forward with both Force-speed and Force-strength. He did not do this by thought, but by instinct. He moved so fast even Valus seemed caught off guard, and both of them tumbled to the dirt. Tobin rolled over the Sith lord, who immediately bounced back to his feet in a fighting stance. His dark trousers and shirt sprayed dust as he moved.

Tobin crouched down, saber ready to strike.

Suddenly Valus laughed. "So, you have some fire after all, boy! That's lesson two. Rage gives you power. I'll bet you've never moved so fast in your life."

"That was despicable," Jalia said, still angry herself.

The Sith shrugged. "I will train him as Sith. Unlike you dainty Jedi, we harness and feed off our emotion. We cherish our rage and hatred." He caught her in a tight gaze. "Our love." He turned back to the still blazing Tobin. "Did you know the Jedi of old were forbidden to form attachments? No marriage, no love. It was thought love was too strong an emotion, like hate, and it would lead to the Dark Side. The Jedi abhorred passion. And they were right, little man. The passion of Anakin Skywalker led to their fall."

"It also led to his redemption," Jalia pointed out.

Valus shrugged. "Showing the Sith were right to harness it. Boy, I am going to teach you every Sith technique I know. You are going to hate me, and you may even want to try and kill me. In fact, if you do, that's all right. That's part of being a Sith. But whether you love me or hate me, you will never ignore me."

He pulled his saber and lit it. "Now, little man, show me what you have."

That was the easiest day of his training under Valus.

Every minute was a challenge. Every test was life or death. There was no praise, only harsh, unyielding criticism, all under the hateful gaze of long-dead Sith. His mother watched, and he sensed many times her desire to intervene, but she did not.

And at night, as his cheeks burned, Tobin felt the two of them together. His mother shielded completely, but Valus not only didn't shield, but broadcast his triumphs every night. Tobin's hatred for the Sith grew unbearable, and he couldn't help but let that hatred seep into his training as the days and weeks progressed.

Five months after their arrival, in the middle of a vicious sparring contest, Valus somersaulted away from a wild swing from Tobin's blue blade and then unleashed a torrent of blue lightning from his hands. The lightning struck Tobin with physical force, searing through his body while at the same time throwing him back against the wall.

In the distance he heard his mother's stuttered cry, but as always, she did nothing. The assault ended, and Valus stepped up to the trembling ball of agony that was Tobin.

"Lesson twenty, Force lightning. It is a rite of passage for all Sith. You cannot know the power of the Sith without experiencing it. That was nothing, I assure you. I could have killed you just now. Instead, I will teach you how to harness this power. And in time your mother will teach you how to deflect it, absorb it or redirect it. For now, go and recover."

The Sith strolled away. Jalia knelt down beside Tobin, who shrugged away with an angry hiss. He looked over his shoulder at her. "How could you do this to me?" he whispered in a harsh voice. "How could you do those things with him?"

"I'm sorry, Tobin," Jalia said. She lifted her chin, stood and walked away after Valus.

Tobin couldn't say how long he lay there. His whole body hurt, and he could smell the faint scent of cooked meat and burnt hair. He looked down and saw the hair on the back of his hands singed.

The first time he tried standing, he fell when his legs collapsed. He closed his eyes and centered himself with a healing meditation as his mother taught him, but the process was so slow. "Now!" he muttered, funneling his anger through the Jedi technique.

Strength flowed through his limbs, washing away the pain. He paused, shocked at how effective the new technique was. He stood, and felt no ill effects at all. In fact, he felt invigorated. He looked around at the angry faces of the Sith, and couldn't help a grin. "I wonder if any of you could ever do that."

The Sith did not answer.

Tobin jogged after his mother and Valus, eager both to show them his quick recovery, and shove the new power in Valus's face.

Their sense in the Force led him up through many of the labyrinthine passages that crisscrossed the planet. He shielded himself as Valus had taught him and followed. ("Lesson twelve, learn to hide." That had been another painful lesson.)

The passage continued up far beyond what Tobin came to think of as the surface levels. He realized this was one of the many massive monuments marking the surface of Korriban.

Eventually all illumination faded except for a tiny ray of white light at the top of a steep flight of stairs. As he approached it, not only could he feel them, he could hear them speaking. The words caused him to stop.

"I don't think I can keep doing this," he heard his mother say. She sobbed, and he was stunned to realize she was crying.

More stunning was the tenderness in Valus's reply. "Jalia, it's the only way," he said. "We both knew this would be hard. You are his only emotional link. If we're going to break that famous Jedi reserve, I have to use it."

"The filth you're sending him…."

"What we share is not filth, Jalia, and you know it. I'm showing him a twisted illusion of it designed to make him angry. His anger gives him power. You've felt it. He truly is the most powerful Force user to ever live. But he can't master Sith techniques without passion."

"He's only fourteen. He shouldn't have to sense things like that."

"I was only fourteen when I killed my first victim," Valus said.

He heard his mother take in a sharp breath.

"He must kill, Jalia. He must be able to do that to survive; to accomplish what we hope he can accomplish."

"He weeps when innocents die," Jalia said. "He's as sensitive as the legends say Ben Skywalker was."

"And yet Ben Skywalker was almost tapped as a Sith apprentice, wasn't he?" Valus reminded her, a hint of the darkness coming to the surface. Tobin heard the man stand and step away from his mother.

"Jalia, we are the last. He's not just your son, but he is my legacy. He's our only hope for the traditions of a hundred thousand years of history to continue. I know this is hard for you, my love. Be strong, and know that he will be the stronger for it."

"I know."

Tobin bowed his head a moment, and then made a show of scuffing dirt from the steps as he leaked some of his presence in the Force. He finished walking up the stairs and emerged on the edge of a small platform, no more than nine meters square, looking over hundreds of kilometers of the planet's surface. Wispy, yellow clouds streaked across the painfully bright blue sky as a white sun burned just over the horizon.

"You recovered quickly," Valus growled menacingly. "Perhaps I was too soft."

"I merged your training," Tobin said quickly, having no desire to feel more lightning. "An angry healing trance."

Jalia stood, clearly stunned. "Tobin, how can you be angry during a healing trance?"

"I don't know, I just did."

"Then I'll not bother going easy on you," Valus said.

"That's fine," Tobin snapped. "But right now, Lord Valus, I would like a word with my mother."

"Oh you would, would you?"

"Enough," Jalia said. "Valus, it's almost time to combine the training anyway. Let us alone for a few minutes."

Valus's crooked smile did not look very loving as he examined her. "A few minutes then. I expect you back in the training room. We have much to discuss today."

He turned and strode quickly back into the absolute black of the hall. Tobin stepped further onto the platform as a warm breeze tugged at his hair. It felt pleasant after the chill of the catacombs.

"I need to know something, Mother," Tobin said. "Do you actually love him?"

Jalia bowed her heard before her son, then squared her shoulder and raised her chin. "What happens between Lord Valus and myself is none of your concern."

"Yes it is. You are my mother. I am your son. We are the last of our line and have only ourselves. Do you love him?"

Jalia stood and started walking away, but stopped in shock when Tobin grabbed her arm. She glared at him, and the boy inside quailed before the familiar gaze. Still, he did not let go.

"I love you," he whispered urgently. "I would die for you. I will train as a Sith for you. But if you do not tell me the truth, it will all end. I will not train, and the next time we spar I'll let Valus cut me down. Tell me, Mother. Do you love him?"

She searched his face angrily, her nostril's flaring as her red hair danced in the Korriban breeze. Whatever she searched for, though, she didn't seem to be able to find. Her shoulders slumped. "I don't know," she finally admitted. "There is no word for what we share. I hate him, and yet I need him. I have been alone for so long, Tobin. When you are older, I'm afraid you'll understand all too well. Just know that I never wanted to hurt you. If I am a source of pain, it is because it is necessary."

Tobin let go. "Thank you for telling me." He watched as she disappeared into the dark after the Sith. Alone, he turned and faced the horizon. It seemed to boil as the white sun touched it.

Whatever his thoughts, the surface winds could not find them. He turned, and joined the others in shadow.


	7. Love, Hate and the Value of Life

**Chapter Seven: Love, Hate and the Value of Life**

Tobin lost all track of time on Korriban, and he knew part of that was intentional. There were no calendars or clocks. There was no marking of the passage of days at all. "The now is all that matters," Valus said over and over again.

Tobin gained a new understanding of Valus the man, but continued to hate Valus the Sith. Valus, for his part, not only didn't mind Tobin's hate, but continued to actively support the position. "I am not your friend," he told Tobin repeatedly. "I am not some silly playmate. While training, I am your master. You will do as I say, or you will be punished severely."

At the same time, his training with his mother restarted. The first example of their combined training was Sith lightning.

Under Valus's tutelage, he learned how to wield the lightning with frightening power. And yet, with his mother, he also learned how to deflect it, how to redirect it, and how to absorb it to gain more power as well.

Some of the training was more esoteric. Valus taught him how to hide himself in the Force, while his mother taught him how to hide himself to the common eye. Valus taught him how to control another's mind, while his mother taught him how to listen to another's mind and protect his own.

Together, they taught him how to fight. They taught him every saber technique either possessed. Single blade, dual blades, a double-bladed saber. The training was intense and painful, and on at least two separate occasions, Tobin suffered burns. One time he almost lost a foot, but was saved at the last second by Jalia when she saw that he had not balanced himself right against Valus's oncoming strike.

Valus himself grinned evilly. "Remember, boy, in a real battle mommy won't be there to save you."

Tobin gritted his teeth and continued with his training.

Some of the powers he learned made him feel dirty. The power to absorb life force was one Valus was especially proud of, and yet Tobin hated the effect it had on his mother when she volunteered to let him use it, or the oily feel of the stolen life energy as it poured into him. But then, on the other side, Jalia taught Tobin how to use the Force as a shield to deflect the draining effects, and how to even turn the Sith absorption into power for the victim.

Even without calendars or clocks, he knew all these lessons passed in just two years. Although neither his mother nor Valus mentioned it, he could feel in the Force brief sparks of surprise when he mastered something they were not expecting him to master so quickly.

One time in particular, he overheard his mother say, "It took me three years to master that."

"He masters skills with a speed I would never have thought possible," Valus admitted. "He's half a click away from us, and it would not surprise me if he were listening to us right now."

"You think he's mastered far-hearing already?"

Valus shrugged, and Tobin tried to hide his smile. What they didn't know for sure wouldn't hurt them.

He continued training. At night, many times he would view the holocron of his ancestor, Leia Organa Solo. In an odd way, it was like speaking to a ghost. The personality matrix of the old Jedi Master transferred so thoroughly it was like speaking to a person, one who was able to anticipate many of his questions.

"Have you ever killed in anger?" he asked his ancestor one evening.

"There were times when I came close," she said. "The Dark Side had seeds in my brother and I, because of our father. It was a hard struggle through many terrible times. But my father also proved the Dark Side is not absolute. Hate can lead you to Darkness, but love can lead you back from it."

As he approached sixteen, things began changing. His morning sparring match was the first sign that he was no longer the boy he used to be. Valus attacked him without warning from the midst of his sleep, as he was sometimes wont to do. The Force warned him, and Tobin was able to roll away with his saber in his hand.

They engaged in a furious flurry of blows, ranging across the room. Whether it was because he was more tired than normal, or frustrated from the previous day's lesson, Tobin found himself fighting with more anger than normal. Not even anger, really, so much as a sense of overwhelming irritation.

They danced and flew around the room, making impossible leaps on walls and the massive statues, soaring across the space and exchanging blows even as they leaped. And then, suddenly, the fight was over and Valus was staring down at a destroyed saber.

Jalia, who had been watching from a hidden corner, stepped out with her jaws agape. "Tobin?" she asked. She turned to Valus.

"I held nothing back," the Sith said. "He beat me fairly." He grinned, and suddenly there was no malice in the expression. "It is time to begin the next step of the training."

Tobin blinked. "The next step?"

"There is always a next step," Valus assured him.

The next morning, Tobin woke alone. He rose and shambled out of their tent and reached out with the Force. He felt a distant presence, but he could not pinpoint where it was coming from.

Rather than his mother and the Sith, he felt something else—something darker; something evil. And a call to come.

"I guess this is the next step," he said to himself.

He began wondering through the catacombs, following the call. As always, the stark, ancient architecture of Korriban both soothed and irritated him. Eventually, though, he passed out into the bright morning light and emerged on the edge of a platform with a crisscross trail of stairs leading down to the bottom of the valley.

The building the call brought him too didn't appear as old as the others, but was still several centuries under the sun. It was easily as large as any of the other ancient monuments, faintly pyramidal in shape with a single unbroken line of stairs leading up to the very top.

The call became almost irresistible, and Tobin chose not to fight at all. He realized this was a test and decided he had to go. He started up the stairs and kept his eyes on the massive stone doors. At the very top, he stopped and stared in surprise. The doors had carved into them the black sunburst symbol of the first Galactic Empire.

From the years he had already spent exploring the Sith catacombs, he knew there was only one way to open the doors. He closed his eyes and reached out with his other senses, until through the Force he was able to see the step on the sandy stone platform. He stepped onto it, and suddenly could see the exact spot he needed on the doors. He raised his hand, and pushed with all the anger he could summon.

The doors opened with a low grinding sound to show the darkened passage within.

He stepped in without hesitation. Perhaps ten meters into the hall, the torches on the walls suddenly ignited of their own accord and burned without smoke. Sith alchemy—something Valus promised he would be shared soon enough.

Tobin continued further into the passageway and finally emerged into a massive hall easily as large as the one they were training in daily. There were no statues lining every space, though. No signs of past Sith dominance. There was a single throne at the end of the otherwise austere room, and behind that throne rose a single tomb. Atop that tomb there was a single statue, but it was only a fraction of the size of the statues that dominated most tombs.

The figure was typical Sith, his face mostly hidden under a deep cloak. The statue was life size, and according to that he was actually a little shorter than Tobin.

As he approached, he sensed a welling of Dark Side energy, and before his eyes the statue seemed to come to life. Only, as the shade stepped from it, he realized it was not the rock moving, but the soul trapped within it.

"Welcome," the shade said. Its voice was thin and reedy, and yet permeated the entire chamber.

Tobin continued walking forward, pausing just before the being.

"You show no fear," it said. "You are indeed powerful."

"This is a test," Tobin said. "The worst that can happen is failure."

"You think that's the worst that can happen?" the Sith ghost said with a startling cackle.

Suddenly the light of the hall dimmed. Voices, tens of thousands of them, all separate and distinct even as they roared together, descended on Tobin. The psychic force of it was overwhelming, and he found himself brought to his knees.

The original shade was the only thing he could see, now surrounded by a nimbus of blue light. "This is a test for your life," the figure said. "We know what our last disciple is doing. We know why. The Force has told us all this is the way it must be. And so we shall bow to the will of the Force. But do not think this guarantees anything. If you are to master the Sith ways, you must be found worthy, or you will surely die."

The voices stopped. Tobin fell back on his rear, stunned from the assault.

"I was the most powerful man alive during my time," the Sith said. "I destroyed the Jedi Order, and ruled an entire galaxy for a quarter of a century, before I fell to treachery. I was Darth Sidious, the first Galactic Emperor."

Tobin climbed back to his feet, and then bowed to the Sith lord in the Sith manner. "Darth Sidious. I am Tobin Solo Artin."

"Yes," Sidious hissed. "The Chosen One. The second in the history of the Force. What is your goal, young one? What do you plan to do with these new powers you gain?"

The question caught Tobin off guard. In all the years of his training, that was one thing he didn't know. He'd posed the question to himself more than once and never was he able to come up with an answer.

The truth is he didn't know what he was going to do. He didn't know what the Force demanded or wanted of him. Frankly, he didn't even know why he was there. What was the point of having all the powers of the Sith and Jedi in a galaxy that despised both?

"That is our final test, then," Sidious said with another hideous cackle. He glided forward. "Come with me." A translucent blue hand shot out and entered Tobin's skull, and instantly the young man blacked out.

When the darkness faded, Tobin found himself standing beside the former emperor on the top of a tower of such height, he could see lines of hover and even space traffic below him. Around him stretched a city of impossible proportions. Towers rose into the clouds and beyond. Space elevators rose into and attached to platforms in low orbit, and there seemed to be almost no distinction between the planet and its orbit. In fact, it seemed almost as if the planet itself were growing beyond the confines of its own atmosphere.

"Where are we?"

"The center of the galaxy," Sidious said. "This is Corusca. In my time, known as Coruscant. It is the seat of the Emperor. And that is the palace."

Sidious pointed, and Tobin found himself staring at a structure so profoundly large that even the massive towers around it seemed dwarfed. It stretched well into the stratosphere of the planet itself, and gleamed gold and silver under the reflected light of Corusca's distant sun.

"It was built on the foundations of my palace," Sidious said with a barely concealed snarl of contempt. "They did so knowingly. Come."

Suddenly they flew not forward toward the palace, but down into the seemingly endless under city, until they reached the hard surface of the planet that never saw any sunlight, and which was covered in a perpetual fog from the microclimate of the under city. Even further, through the crumbling buildings that formed the foundation of the current city, until they reached a huge, rounded pipe.

They suddenly flew along the pipe, along endless stretches of darkness, until at last they emerged up through floors lined in opulence and wealth. Suddenly, they stood in a room large enough to house a frigate. The room was lined with twenty ten meter-high windows spaced five meters apart. Standing before the windows was a man of medium age dressed in an unmarked officer's uniform, but with bright red trim. He wore a thin circlet on his head and carried himself with straight-backed authority. The figure beside him was draped in the purple robes of a state minister.

They were speaking hushed tones.

"And you're sure?" the man in red trim said.

"Yes, Majesty. The tests were confirmed thrice by myself and the palace physician. No others have seen them. She is close to 16,000."

The Emperor of the Galaxy reared as if struck and stared out a window. "She's my only child," he said.

"The law is clear," the minister said. "None with such numbers can be allowed to live. The princess cannot have that many midichlorians."

Emperor Antias Huun Fel III gave a curt nod. "I understand. Ensure that she does not have that many."

"The physician has already been dealt with. The official results were never entered. But Majesty, what happens when she starts to evidence her power?"

"I am told my ancestor Leia Organa did not show any Force abilities until her cursed brother introduced her to her heritage. Perhaps it is enough that Mariha will never know."

"Let us pray that is so," the minister said. The two of them stepped out of the room.

"The minister man is already dead," Sidious said to Tobin with a gleeful grin. "The Emperor has him killed as soon as all records of the test are falsified to show a much lower midichlorian count."

Tobin turned and looked at the former Sith Lord. "How can you be showing me this? Was another princess born? There was only one princess when I was a child, and she was only a year younger than myself."

"There is only one princess," Sidious said. "If there had been others, she would likely be dead. But she is the only one. What you see is the past."

"Why?"

Sidious turned to Tobin and glared. "Why do you think, boy? Is the future of the Force held in the hands of an imbecile?"

"The Emperor broke his own law to protect his child. It is a scandal, to be sure, but would that be enough to stop the persecution of Force-sensitives?"

"With a mind so weak as yours, we may never know," Palpatine sneered. "Watch now."

They stood in the same room, only now the light coming from the windows was the reflected light of the cityscape at night. A girl-child of ten sat on the floor playing with an elaborate construction of bricks that ran almost the circumference of her room. A tutor stood by her side, loudly berating her for failing a test that he knew she should have passed with ease.

The scolding went on for much longer than even Tobin thought it should have. He watched as the little girl's face dropped and her eyes grew moist. From the expression Tobin sensed these scoldings happened on a regular basis. Suddenly the princess turned and screamed at the man to leave. The tutor jumped back as if struck. In fact, when Tobin looked closer, the man had been struck. Something had pushed him back from the princess.

She had given the man an elementary Force-push.

Almost instantly the Emperor was there with a pair of his crimson-clad guards. "That will be enough, Solrin," the Emperor said. "Please come with me."

The princess, still upset, fell to her knees and cried while the Emperor stepped out of the room with his arm around the quiet tutor.

"Majesty," the man said, "I didn't see anything." He knew.

Beside Tobin, Sidious began to chuckle.

One of the crimson guards removed a stunrod and turned the power to its maximum setting. The tutor was not even able to scream. He tensed as the current flowed through him and made only a low grunting sound as the charge stopped his heart. He fell dead to the floor.

"Remove him," the Emperor said. "And make sure the next tutor knows his place."

"At once," the killer guard said.

"What does this tell you, boy?" Sidous demanded.

"The Emperor will do anything to protect his daughter," Tobin said.

"And what will you do about that?"

"Use it to as a weakness."

"And what will you do with that weakness?"

Tobin considered the words as Sidious glared at him. "There is only one way I could change the laws," he finally said to himself.

"Yes!" Sidious said. "You are a Solo and a Fel. If not for your power you would be in the order of succession."

They moved again, and once more found themselves in the tomb of Darth Sidious. The dead Sith continued to glare. "You will be Emperor, or you will die in the attempt and the Force itself will die with you. Are you ready?"

"No, but I will be," Tobin said.

"You'd better be."

Just like that, the shade of Sidious was gone, and Tobin found himself standing alone in the tomb. The test, it appeared, was over.

Valus no longer woke Tobin by attacking him. After Tobin intercepted Valus in mid-leap with a powerful Force-grip and tossed him back against a stone wall, the Sith laughed heartily even as he rubbed his sore back. "You've learned that lesson!" he said.

That was the end of the morning assaults.

Still, after years of waking up on the edge of death, Tobin found the time wired into his consciousness and woke at first light regardless. One particular morning, as he climbed from the tent, he found Valus waiting for him.

"It is time for your next test," the Sith said.

Tobin knew better than to ask. He nodded and followed Valus up through the catacombs to the surface.

"A pirate ship landed last night," Valus explained as they walked. "They discovered the planet a few years ago by accident and return occasionally to store their goods. I've not interfered, but the fact they know of this world is a threat to us."

Tobin said nothing, but he began to suspect what Valus wanted. "I'm not a murderer," Tobin said.

"Perhaps not," Valus replied calmly. "Everything has a price, Tobin; a value. Even life itself. The Sith understand this. Some life is more valuable than other life. A nerf has less value, say, than the hunger that drives us to slaughter and eat it. The same is true for sentient life as well. Some people are simply more valuable than others."

"That's a singularly Sith way of thinking," Tobin noted.

"Perhaps. There are guards whose sole existence is to die so that the Emperor may live. There magistrates who regularly condemn fourteen to fifteen otherwise healthy infants a year to death because their midichlorian counts are too high. Society itself determines the value of life. Because of your Jedi training you've been taught that all life is precious. I don't dispute this. What I am telling you is that some lives are more precious than others."

They emerged on the top of an overlook on the edge of another one of Korriban's many valleys. In the base of the valley Tobin saw an old, battered transport ship. It was large enough to carry twenty men comfortably, plus a significant amount of cargo. As they emerged, Tobin could see the crew ferrying crates from the hold of the ship into a cavern that would ordinarily be hidden behind an open stone door.

"Come," Valus said. The Sith stepped off the edge of the sheer overlook and fell the forty meters without pause. Tobin followed and, using the Force to cushion his landing, fell lightly beside his Sith master. The two trudged toward the ship.

"You want me to kill them, don't you?" Tobin asked.

"Yes," Valus said.

"I don't think I can kill in cold blood," Tobin said.

"You will," the Sith said with absolute certainty.

They arrived at the shuttle. Without hesitation, Valus ignited his saber and started scoring the repulsor coil pads under the ship, limiting, and eventually destroying the ship's ability to take off. The pirates by then had left the ship completely as they finished loading their booty.

Valus returned to Tobin's side. "There is one more lesson—one more skill I have to teach you. I've been waiting until the time was right to show you. The time is now."

Tobin tensed, knowing that what he meant was not a demonstration, but an assault with a new Sith technique. He was not disappointed, but neither could he have been prepared. Valus raised his hand, and the world exploded around them. Fierce, whipping winds and sand swirled in a vortex directly over Tobin, assaulting him with rocks and debris. Objects of varying sizes soared through the storm to strike at Tobin. He deflected the objects as best he could with the Force, but there were just too many.

Finally, a rock as large as his head slipped through his defenses, and he saw a bright explosion of red before fading into darkness.

"We should have killed him already," a harsh voice said.

Tobin managed to pry an eye open and found himself looking at a mongrel. The man, if he could be called that, appeared to be a bastardized mix of several species with a grossly swollen face and nose and tiny eyes. He looked almost porcine, with a single protruding tooth.

Behind the mongrel stood a Rodian in a red spacer's vest, and behind him an odd assortment of creatures, all glaring.

"Little space rat," mongrel said. "You strand us here. I want make sure you know big mistake that is afore I kills you."

Two large hands grabbed the front of Tobin's robe and pulled him to his feet, only to slam him against the wall. Instantly hands and feet pummeled him.

Tobin Force-pushed with a desperate roar, and all the pirates went flying. He stood shakily and glared at the stunned pirates. "This is a test for me," he told them. He was surprised at how hoarse and angry he sounded. "Nothing but a stupid test. My master wants me to kill you all. Let me go, repair your ship and leave."

The pirates didn't listen. "Blasted freak," mongrel said. "He be just one them freaking abnormal. Kill him, boys!"

Without pause they all pulled their weapons. "Please don't make me hurt you," Tobin pleaded.

"Hah!" the Mongrel snorted. "You just a freak; we gonna vape you good!"

"Please don't make me do this!" Tobin begged.

"Shoot 'em."

A dozen blasters fired. Time slowed as Tobin sank his whole consciousness into the Force. Even so the blaster bolts sped toward him. He crouched and rolled away, and realized this was the moment of the test. This was what Valus was trying to impart to him. Life was precious. Was his life more precious than the lives of the pirates trying to kill him?

Would he kill to save himself?

He knew he could run and escape, but with their ship damaged there was nothing to keep them from trying to hunt him down. Incapacity would be little better—he couldn't keep them captive for long before they escaped to hunt him again.

They were firing on him again, and merging both Jedi and Sith techniques he continued to evade the fire, while pondering his next act.

If they escaped and told others, then everyone was at risk. Intellectually, he knew what he had to do. Emotionally, the thought of killing men who had no real chance of harming him made him sick.

"Everything has a price," Valus had said.

Tobin realized now that he had no choice but to pay that price.

Lightning filled the cabin of the damaged shuttle. Men screamed. Through the Force Tobin sensed, and with his eyes Tobin watched, as every one of the in the ship died at this hands. All it took was one blast of Force lightning. It didn't even require all his strength or power. Just a thought, and the whole crew of pirates died.

Somehow, when it ended, the whole experience seemed…easy. It was too easy to kill them. In the silence, Tobin stood alone, staring at the bodies of the first sentient beings he had ever killed, and it was too easy.

He sensed a presence, and turned to see his mother. Staring at her now, he was shocked to see that she was not the same woman he had grown up with. These past years on Korriban, and the years before on the star destroyer, had aged her. The red of her hair had silvered in spots, and lines crept back from her eyes and mouth. She was not yet forty as far as he knew, and yet she looked as if she were already approaching fifty.

He realized then that his training had been as hard on her as it was on him. Harder, in many ways.

He looked over his shoulder at the bodies of the men, then back to his mother. "I killed them," he said.

"I felt it."

"It was too easy."

She rushed to him then, grabbing his shoulders. "Tobin," she said urgently, "don't ever think that. Don't ever think it's easy to take life."

"But it is," Tobin said. "It was so easy to kill them. They all had guns and they were all shooting, and yet they never had a chance. I sank into the Force and moved faster than they could move, and now they're all dead. It was easy to kill them." He bowed his head, and felt the frustration welling up inside. "It's the price that's hard. I understand now what Valus was trying to tell me. Killing's easy, as long as you can pay the price for it."

When he looked up, his mother's face was stricken, her eyes rimmed with unshed tears. He stepped past her, and left the shuttle.


	8. Graduation

**Chapter Eight: Graduation**

Tobin was approaching twenty years of age when his training ended.

In the last few months he had taken to running across the surface of the planet at speeds that even Valus and Jalia had trouble matching. At first, Valus ran with him. The Sith considered it a challenge. But as they ran Tobin drew on the Force, funneling his yearning and confusion and even anger into Jedi techniques to replenish and heal himself.

Even more, though, he realized during the course of his training that neither Valus nor his mother were able to sink themselves into the Force as he did. When they used the Force, it was as if they gathered it to themselves, like pulling in a breath. But Tobin did not pull it into himself. He sank into the Force itself, merging with it in a way neither of his masters could.

In that state, there was no exhaustion. There were no limits. He constantly left Valus behind, often kilometers at a time. On the day his training ended, he was sunk so thoroughly into the Force Valus could barely even see him, much less keep up with him. He came to the edge of the valley, and embraced as he was in the Force, Tobin did not even hesitate to launch himself from the valley wall. He flew in an arc over the entire kilometer-wide valley, and landed mid-stride on the other side. His feet did not even stop moving.

By the time he finished his lap around the region and returned to the cave, Valus stood waiting for him. The Sith was as always dressed in his traditional black trousers and smock, but his grin seemed singularly un-Sithlike.

"I had to send out an aerial drone, but I was able to see that jump. I've never seen anyone come as close to flying as you did then. Simply amazing."

It was the first time Valus had openly praised Tobin, and the young man wasn't entirely sure what it meant. "Come," Valus said. "Your mother is waiting for you."

The two walked in what could almost be described as companionable silence, except that one of them was Sith.

They arrived at the tomb that had been their home for the past six years, and indeed Jalia was there waiting for him. She dressed that day in her best and only Jedi robe, just as Valus wore his best Sith clothes. As they approached, Valus left Tobin's side to join Jalia. The two, the Last Jedi and the Last Sith, stood side-by-side as they studied him.

"When I woke this morning," Jalia said, "I sensed in the Force that the day had come. I have nothing left to teach you, Tobin. Neither does Valus. Other than what lessons you can glean from the holocron, you have completed your training."

"But there is one last thing I wish to give you," Jalia said. She reached into the sash of her robes and removed a single signet ring. "This was the signet ring of Princess Sariah Fel. Only persons of direct royal descent may wear it. There is a DNA scanner in it that will sever the finger of any one not of royal blood. I have placed it on my finger before, so that it can record my DNA. Now it is time for you to have it."

"I doubt it would fit," Tobin said.

"It is made of fluid gold," Jalia said. "The molecules of the gold will expand to the width of your finger, or contract to sever it if you are not a Fel descendent. Put it on, Tobin. The time for hiding our lineage is over."

Tobin took the gold ring from his mother. The signet held an ornately carved F for the Fel family, overlaid by the Imperial crest For something with the ability to do as his mother described, the ring was deceptively small. However, if felt warm to his touch. With a last look at Jalia and Valus, he slipped the finger over the ring finger of his right hand.

The warmth continued as the gold seemed to crawl over his skin. He watched as the ring really did expand, until it fit snugly on his finger. He waited a moment, expecting at any moment for the ring to contract until the finger came off, but it did not.

"You are Tobin S'Artin no longer," Jalia said. "Your true name is Tobin Solo Fel Artin, son of Jalia Jaina Solo Fel Artin, daughter of Jianis Solo Fel Artin, son of Avdarin Solo Fel Artin, son of Andeus Solo Fel Artin, son of…" She recited Tobin's entire geneology without pause or hesitation, as if the names were long captured to her memory. Tobin knew why she recited those names now, and concentrated on every name and every word. He locked them all deep into his mind, ensuring he would never forget. "…son of Princess Sariah Solo Fel, daughter of his Imperial Majesty, Emperor Soontir Solo Fel II. By confirmation of the Fel royal signet, you are of the Royal blood. Never forget, my son."

"I won't," Tobin said. He looked from his mother's somber face, to the more jovial one of Valus. "Why today?" Tobin asked. "I haven't had any new lessons in several months."

Valus looked up, and unconsciously Tobin sank himself into the Force and instantly felt it. A ship had made orbit. A large ship filled with many hundreds of thousands of people.

"Shishtari eagles do not leave the nest on their own," Valus said as his gaze settled back to Tobin. "They are forced out, not by their mother, but by the father returning from his hunting cycle. The father throws them out of the nest, where they either fly or plummet to their death. In this way, only the strongest survive to continue the species. The Sith believe conflict is the process whereby the strong thrive, and the weak are eliminated. That time has come for you to be thrown from the nest, Tobin."

"There will be a fight today," Jalia said. "I can't tell you if we survive or not, but those above us are coming in anger. Somehow they know we are here. If you survive today, then your training will be complete."

"If not, then we will know you were not the Chosen One after all," Valus said with an indifferent shrug. Sith to the last.

The sound of drop shuttles reverberated through the hall. Tobin turned and ran back to the main entrance, and behind him he knew the other two did as well. They emerged just as the first of ten shuttles were landing. The shuttles carried no markings other than the marks of battle. Several were scored by old laser cannon fire, but otherwise there was nothing to mark them as Imperial. However, they looked very familiar.

Tobin and his mother had an identical shuttle hidden in a nearby cave. These were the pirates from the star destroyer they fled from. Somehow the Zabrak had discovered Korriban. And judging by the sheer number of pirates pouring out of the shuttles, they were determined to take complete control of it.

Valus arrived at Tobin's side. "A few months ago, I went back and hid the pirate freighter. Levitating something that large was…challenging. But when I deactivated all the systems an automated beacon went off. It only managed to broadcast for ten seconds before I destroyed it, but I knew that eventually someone would intercept the broadcast and triangulate where we were. I knew it was only a matter of time before we had to flee this world."

On Tobin's other side, Jalia came to a stop and examined the pirate troopers. "The Zabrak brought all of his raiding crews. Looks like four hundred men."

"So many?" Tobin asked.

The pirates poured from their shuttles like so many insects from the hive, made small by distance. Even so, there were a huge number of them. "We can set traps throughout the catacombs," Tobin said. "We could defeat them."

"We could," Valus said, "and we will. Come!"

The pirate raiding parties formed up into squads of forty men grouped by the shuttles they arrived in. The ten squads broke up and began exploring the ruins. At the head of each was a pirate equipped with the most advanced scanning equipment available. Scanners could detect heat, motion, even the presence of complex organic compounds that indicated life forms in the air. Tobin knew from his training with Valus that such devices were so sensitive that even if Tobin could hide himself, they could detect the organic compounds exhaled with his breath.

They did not try to hide from the machines, and as a consequence all four hundred raiders slowly converged on the main entrance to the catacombs.

Tobin chose a spot against the stone ceiling of the entrance, invisible in shadow, from which to watch their movement. At their lead, he saw a familiar figure towering over the others.

The Zabrak had changed little. He had no hair to gray, though his horns did seem a little longer than before. This was normal, since Zabrak horns continue to grow for life. But he was the only one Tobin recognized. He knew his mother would probably recognize more of them.

Tobin sank himself into the Force and threw his senses far and wide. "It's a trap," he heard the Zabrak say. "These abnormals are smart. They hid from our ships sensors when they escaped last time, so I know they could try to hide better from these. They want us to sense where they are."

The others waited for the Zabrak to make up his mind, and so did Tobin. _Come in,_ Tobin _whispered_ to the Zabrak. _It is a trap, but you can defeat it. You are the Zabrak_

The Zabrak visibly swayed under the power of Tobin's compulsion. "It's a trap," the Zabrak said. "But we can defeat it. I am the Zabrak!" He shook himself, as if waking from a dream. "Come, friends, let's go defeat this trap and kill those abnormals! The bounty on their heads will allow the whole lot of us to retire to a life of ease and wealth!"

The other pirates cheered and they began pouring into the passage. Tobin waited patiently as they came in and then started to bottleneck as the passage narrowed. Sith catacombs were not just meant to honor their dead, but also to be defended.

Tobin let half the pirates in before he reached out with the Force and ripped the stones of the roof ahead of him free. Blocks the size of speeder cars fell into the middle of the line of pirates and threw the whole passage into darkness.

Into the darkness, a red and then a blue lightsaber lit, as Jalia and Valus charged the divided pirate force from the front. Tobin dropped from his hiding place and lit his saber.

This was the value of his life and the lives of his mother and Valus—that value was the blood of the pirates he began spilling. Caught in darkness between two opposing sets of lightsabers, the pirates collapsed into fear and chaos. Blasters discharged in every direction, killing fellow pirates as effectively as lightsabers.

After six years of training with a Sith, Tobin learned how to shut off that part of his mind that cried out in pain with each life that ended. And there were so many, crying and calling out to friends and comrades who in all likelihood were the very ones that fired the killing shot.

With his senses enmeshed with the Force, Tobin saw everything as clearly as if it was day, but the pirates were in utter darkness, until one loud voice called over the cries and screams of pain. "Put your bloody thermal goggles on your stupid space rats!" the Zabrak roared.

Many were too terrified to comply, or simply didn't hear, but enough did obey that the previously random blaster shots began to slow and concentrate on the lightsabers.

Even one with the Force, Tobin knew that he was not impervious. Other Force-users had died in the past, and he knew it could happen just as easily to him. Still, of the two hundred they trapped, almost half perished at the hands of only three defenders.

Tobin felt Jalia and Valus retreating back into the passage. He launched himself against the walls of the high, narrow passage and ran as fast as he could, using his speed and momentum to hold himself against the wall. When that began to fail, he leaped over the heads of his attackers to the other side and repeated the process, until by switching walls he was able to pass over the whole attack force.

The three defenders regrouped in one of the main Sith tombs off the main passage, well ahead of the pirates. Valus was grinning evilly, but Jalia was breathing hard and favoring her left shoulder. As she turned to meet him, he saw why. A blaster bolt must have slipped through her defense and given her a glancing blow to her shoulder.

"Are you okay?" he asked.

"Does it matter?" Jalia snapped. "I'll be fine. There is no slowing down, and there is no going back."

"There is only victory, or death," Valus said. "The next best site is the tomb of Darth Avadra. It is another high, narrow passage with an abrupt turn and a two hundred meter drop to the floor of her tomb itself. If one of us were to play the lame duck, we could likely lead a whole group to their deaths."

"Then it should be me," Tobin said. "The two of you should set up the next trap on the other side of the tomb."

Jalia opened her mouth to protest taking orders from Tobin, but then realized she had no better suggestion and nodded. "May the Force be with you," she said softly as she and Valus left. After they were gone, Tobin stepped back out into the main passage and lay down on the steps.

Already he could hear the pirates coming down the long, slanting hall. He released some of his Sith shielding and allowed his body heat to bloom. Those at the head of the raiding party would see a gradual spot of light in their thermal goggles. He released his shields completely around his thigh, and knew that this spot would appear brighter than the others. To someone using a thermal imaging system, it would appear there was a burn scorched on his thigh.

He heard voices whispering as they got closer, and could feel the excitement and the anger building. Finally, the Zabrak roared, "Get him, boys!"

Tobin made a show of scrambling to his feet as the pirates charged. He used his lightsaber to deflect blasts, but was careful to only deflect one or two back into his attackers. He didn't want them backing off.

Fears of them retreating were ill-founded, however. If anything, they charged harder and Tobin found himself having to retreat even faster. He faked his limp, but the very process of pretending to be injured slowed him down.

He followed twisting passages he had come to know like the back of his hand and led them into the long, narrow passage of the tomb of Darth Avadra. Ahead, he could see nothing with his eyes, but with his face he could feel the cold breeze and with his ears he could hear the echo of distance. With the Force he knew the cliff was nearby.

Thermal imaging would be enough to show them the edge of the cliff if they saw him disappear. But if they saw him continue beyond the cliff, they would have no reason to stop. Tobin sank into the Force and when he reached the abrupt turn where a walker had to know to turn hard right or else plummet to their deaths, Tobin continued straight and stepped off the edge of the platform.

The Force buoyed his feet and he continued his false limp as he "walked" over air. The pirates in the lead had no reason to even bother to notice the floor ended. The walls and floor were at the same ambient temperature of the air itself, and so in their scopes there was almost no difference. With the brightly lit target of Tobin directly in front of them, the pirates surged forward, and began falling to their deaths.

"Switch to active IF!" the Zabrak called out once more, and once more the pirates under his command did so. With the active infrared scopes projecting light outside the normal spectrum of most sentient vision, the pirates were able to see the impossible. Their target stood in open air ten meters out beyond the edge of the drop off.

The Zabrak himself shouldered through the men until he stood on the edge of the drop-off. "You've grown, boy!" he shouted at Tobin.

"So have you, Zabrak. I would suggest cutting back the nerf steaks."

"We've come to take back our shuttle."

"You're welcome to it. How long until you collect it and leave?" Tobin asked innocently.

"Not too much longer, Abnormal," Zabrak growled.

There was something wrong. What Tobin heard in the other man's voice was a confidence that should not have been there. Zabrak had just lost three hundred and fifty of his men against three defenders. That should have given him pause. But there was no anxiety in what Tobin sensed of the Zabrak. Rather it was a sense of anticipation, and even glee.

Tobin threw his senses skyward, and trembled with what he detected.

"You've contacted Imperials?" Tobin asked, incredulous.

"I've contacted MY imperials, boy," Zabrak said. "The sector Moff has been receiving kickbacks from us for ten years. So did the Moff before her. Why do you think we were able to operate so openly? If the Empire wanted to destroy us, it could. But we're useful. We do the work the Emperor doesn't want to do himself. We're a magnet for those he wants out of the Empire, and a weapon to those he wants destroyed without trial. And right now, boy, he wants you and that fellow freak of yours destroyed. And he's going to help us do it."

Darkness threatened Tobin. He had been so concentrated on the pirates he never even opened himself for any other threats. Once he did, he immediately felt the Imperial troopers descending on the tomb from the other side.

The side Valus and Jalia were setting up their trap.

Tobin allowed himself to drop abruptly from his position and fell freely three hundred meters. He slowed himself and landed lightly at the base of Avadra's massive tomb. Avadra had made up for her mediocre tenure as Sith Lord by having an obscenely large tomb built for herself.

_Mother_! Tobin shouted through the Force.

He heard the sound of blaster fire and received a sense of determination and pain from his mother. The Imperial troopers had attacked.

Tobin ran as fast as he could. The whole hall blurred before his eyes. Those looking from the shadows would have seen a rush of air as he flew by. He soared up the steps to the spot Jalia and Valus had chosen for their ambush, and came to a halt abruptly.

His mother lay on the ground. Her eyes were closed in pain and her breath came in short spasms as she clutched her chest. A force of Imperial troopers flooded the space in front the fallen Jedi with their high-powered arm blasters firing rapidly.

Only one thing stood between them and Jalia. Darth Valus, last Dark Lord of the Sith, stood with his feet apart and a deathly evil grin on his face, as he wielded his lightsaber faster than even the expertly trained troopers could follow. His robe was shredded with burn marks where blaster bolts had come close, but so far none had struck.

Over his shoulder, Valus yelled, "Take her!"

Tobin nodded. While his mother's emotions for the Sith had been complex at best and ambiguous at worst, the Sith's motions for her had been very simple. Darth Valus, Dark Lord of the Sith, loved Jalia with all his heart. So much so he was willing to commit what amounted to the worst crime a Sith could commit. He was going to give his life in the hope it would save another.

Tobin gripped his mother in his power and pulled her from the ledge. She came to his arms, gasping in pain. So close, he could smell the burned flesh of her chest where she took the blaster bolts. He could see the scorch marks. He felt as her heart struggled to beat with only half its tissue.

His mind closed off all thought. He could not afford to think about what this meant. He couldn't afford to dwell on the fact that his mother took a blaster bolt to the chest. All he knew was that he had to get away.

He carried her easily as he fled back down the passage any into the tomb. By this time Zabrak and his pirates had already reached the floor, but they remained only in a corner of the huge space. Tobin easily by-passed them and reached the passage that would eventually take them to their home catacomb.


	9. The Right Path

**Chapter Nine: The Right Path**

When Tobin reached their tent, Jalia's face was ashen and her breathing shallow. Each short breath ended in a gurgle, and already Tobin could see blood pooling in her mouth and dripping down the side of her cheek.

He carried her inside and laid her down on her cot. She kept her eyes closed, and he could feel her trying to ease her pain with the Force. "I'm here," he whispered. He took her hand, and sent as much energy into as he could.

"It's too much light," she whispered weakly.

Tobin stopped, stunned. "You're so much stronger than you…realize," she whispered. "Tobin, I'm sorry for the pain I caused. I…" She stopped and coughed. Blood sprayed from her mouth.

Tobin felt suddenly frozen with a panic and fear he'd never felt before. "Mother, what do I do?" he asked.

"You survive," she said when the fit faded. "You survive and grow strong, and when the time comes, you will restore balance to the Force. You are the Chosen One." She forced her eyes open. "I never told you how proud I was of you, my son. And how much I love you. I will always love you, and I…" She stopped speaking though her lips continued moving.

"Mother," Tobin begged desperately. "I don't know what to do without you."

She turned her head toward him. Her lips stopped moving, and instead he felt her reaching out to him in the Force. He embraced her mind in his. He held her hand when her eyes widened. Her spasms grew worse as she tried for and failed to get air, and her damaged heart shuddered.

The widened eyes lost focus, and slowly dimmed. In the Force, Tobin felt her slowly slipping away from him. He tried grab on to her. He used all the healing powers he had, all the strength he could garner, but it was not enough.

_Let me go, my son,_ she whispered to him. _There is no death. There is only the Force._

Whether he let go, or her presence grew too tenuous to hold, Tobin would never know. All he knew was that one moment he still felt her, and the next she was gone. He looked down and saw the life fading from the body. Then, the body itself began to fade. She grew lighter and lighter in his arms, until there was no weight at all. There was a faint sparkle around the outline of her head, and then she simply faded away into nothing.

A moment later, he felt a spike through the Force, and sensed that Valus too had finally succumbed.

As quickly as that, Tobin was completely, utterly alone. He could not move, nor even breathe. There were no tears because he could not believe she was gone. The images his eyes observed were trapped by a disbelieving mind.

He stood and stumbled out of the tent, but quickly froze. He was surrounded by death. Literally. Hundreds of Sith shades stood around him, filling the floor of the tomb. They did not speak to him, but instead merely stood staring. Finally, one figure moved forward. It was the ghost of Darth Sidious himself.

"The last Sith is dead," Sidious said. "The last Jedi as well. You are the last vessel of our teachings. The last vessel of the Force. For your sacrifice, we honor you. We will assist you as we can. Escape how you might."

Tobin did not thank them, for these were Sith. They did what they did for their own sakes, not for his. Instead, he nodded and ducked back into the tent. He grabbed his mother's lightsaber and the holocron, and nothing else.

When he came back out of the tent, he found himself alone once more. The shades of the Sith were gone. However, on the currents of the Force he could feel them moving. Pirates and troopers alike began to feel indescribable chills. Men inexplicably fell off the edges of cliffs or chasms even though they should have clearly seen the danger.

Fear began building among the invaders, and that was exactly what the army of dead Sith wanted. The fear fueled them and gave them strength, and their attacks became even more intense. Objects flew from walls. Stones shot up from the floors or down from ceilings. Men felt sudden spikes of icy cold in their chest and a strange pressure on their chests, and then fell suddenly dead to the ground.

Tobin sensed the Zabrak call for a general retreat. As far as he knew, with Jalia's death his job was finished. The Imperials attempted to be more thorough in their search, but when an entire squad stepped off a cliff when the floor literally disappeared under their feet, the Imperial commander decided it was also wiser to withdraw.

Tobin left them all behind. He emerged from the catacombs near the pirate shuttles. He sensed at least three men guarding them. It was easy to fade completely into the Force. He knew from Valus's reaction in the past that when he did this he not only faded from the senses of those around him, but also from their sight.

He approached the three, and steadied himself. He emerged from the Force before them, his green saber pulsing. They started to cry out, but he cut them down quickly.

It took only a moment to pull his robes off and switch with the burn-scarred robes of one of the dead guards. The guard he chose was an Ubese, with a complete environmental suit and mask.

Or so it appeared. In fact, once he shed the pirate's suit, Tobin discovered a young human male only a few years older than himself with just the hints of a mustache. In all likelihood, the young man was playing off the fierce reputation of the Ubese to enhance his own career.

Once dressed as an Ubese warrior, Tobin carried the now disrobed pirate to one of the other drop shuttles. Once inside the shuttle, he programmed an automated course into the nav computer that would take the shuttle into orbit and then launch into a series of random hyperspace coordinates.

He left the shuttle and followed his own footsteps in the sand to where the other bodies lay. Behind him, the shuttle launched amid a flurry of sand. He laid down with the bodies, and waited.

A moment later, he heard the searing roar of a heavy turbolaser blast ripping through the air, followed a moment later by the report of a distant explosion. He opened his eyes and looked up at the fireball in the sky that had been the shuttle.

The pirates started pouring out of the catacombs moments later. Tobin saw many harried, wide-eyed expressions and knew the Sith shades definitely took a toll. At their lead, his face twisted by a grimace of hate, came the Zabrak.

"Cahrrak, what happened?"

Tobin quickly realized the question was addressed to him. He made a show of stumbling to his feet. "The Abnormal did some magic on me."

"No more," the Zabrak said. "No more Abnormal magic from here on. Get your arses aboard." He started walking up the ramp. "Moff Hershied better by VERY nice to me after all the men I wasted in this stupidity!"

Tobin followed after the Zabrak without a word, and in moments he and the rest of the pirates were rocketing skyward. He saw the all too familiar star destroyer that he and his mother lived on for so long and closed his eyes in an attempt to force the memories back down.

Within sight through the portholes of the shuttle, he could also see two Imperial corvettes in orbit. Both ships brought their turbolaser batteries around to the surface and began to fire.

The shuttles docked and the pirates unloaded. As the others headed about on the way to whatever duties awaited them, Tobin wandered toward the invisible barrier holding the atmosphere in. He stood there inches away from naked space, and watched as the Imperials continued to bombard the surface of the planet.

In his mind, Tobin could hear the outraged screams of the Sith shades as their tombs and catacombs were destroyed. Still the barrage continued unabated, targeting a swath of land as the ships orbited. It took much longer than if they were the old star destroyers, almost five hours all told, but in the end the entire surface of Korriban was blasted into molten glass.

When the last shot was fired, the corvettes spun around away from the pirate destroyer, and set a course for the nearest hyperspace lane. The voices of the Sith faded as the objects and alchemy that contained their souls were destroyed. The power Tobin held inside him was the last vestige the Sith had.

He was the last vestige of the Jedi as well.

"Carhhk," an unfamiliar voice said.

Tobin turned and saw an Ithorian pirate motion for him. "The boss was looking for you. You okay?"

"The Abnormal must have done some mind trick," Tobin lied. "I feel weird."

The Ithorian made a sub-vocal growl from one of his throats. "Go lay down. I'll tell the boss you're hurt."

"Thanks."

He did not go back to Carhhk's room, though. Rather, he made his way through the body of the ship to the all-but-forgotten communications deck. He did not know what he expected to find there, but he knew what he hoped for.

He stepped to the edge of the pit leading down to the observation window.

His heart skipped a beat. She was there—a lean figure, somehow regal as she stood with her head bowed before the window. Her eyes were covered with the veil as always, but as he moved and saw her profile, she looked as beautiful as ever.

Suddenly his cheeks blazed as shame crashed down on him. His mother was dead. His Sith master died defending her, and all he could think about was a pretty girl. He truly wasn't worthy of the tasks his masters had given him.

"Hello, Tobin," Klinti said softly.

The shame burned brightly a moment more, and then faded to an emptiness inside. He took off the Ubese mask and walked down the steps. "Klinti," he said.

"You've changed," she said. She turned her face toward him and smiled wryly behind her veil. "You're much brighter now. Stronger."

"I've learned a lot," Tobin confessed. "How are you?"

"Older," she said. "No wiser, but definitely older." She turned back toward the window. The destroyer broke orbit and followed a different route away from the planet. "I saw two lights extinguished on the planet. One blue, one red. Both were very strong."

"My mother," Tobin admitted. "And my other teacher."

"I'm so sorry." She was, too. He could hear her sorrow clearly. "You're not the same boy I knew. Before you were all light. Now you're gray. You've killed." She said the last almost as an accusation.

"I have," Tobin admitted. "I did not want to, but I have killed. I killed many of the men on this ship down there, before Mother died."

"You are a boy no longer," Klinti said. She reached out a hand, and Tobin took it without hesitation. "When the Zabrak finds out you're aboard, he'll try to kill you. What will you do?"

"I will kill again, until I don't have to kill any more."

She bowed her head, and her sorrow stabbed at him. "And when will that be? Once you become a killer, there never seems to be a time to be anything else."

"I didn't choose this path."

"But you can choose to stay on it, or pick your own."

Tobin thought about his mother and Valus staring at him expectantly. He was the sum of their training. He was the last fully trained Force-user in the galaxy. He was of royal blood living as fugitive. What paths were there?

He felt from her then something he had never mastered—visions of futures that could be. He saw a future of him falling before a hail of blaster fire. He saw a future of him standing atop a mountain of corpses with a crown on his head. He saw a future of him savagely boarding imperial ships and killing with glee.

He saw a vision of he and Klinti entwined together on a bed in a small home in a peaceful world.

Paths, he knew. Paths that opened and closed with every choice he made. He knew then that Klinti loved him, and that she could be his if he but chose the path with her. He also knew that path was not the one his masters wanted; not the one the Force demanded.

He held her hand to his lips and kissed her fingers gently. "I must follow the Force."

Klinti froze. "The Force seems to be a cold mistress," she said. "It has led so many to death."

_Like it led your mother_. Tobin caught the unspoken comment and realized it was the truth. The Force had led her to her death, and the death of Valus. The Force was not all powerful, nor was it some omnipotent power. Those following it were not gods, as witnessed by the terrible number that have perished.

But the other paths she showed were no less palatable. "There has to be another way," he said to himself.

"My sight is limited," Klinti said. Her voice caught as the path she desired faded from her foresight. "Whatever you choose," she said again, "I will aid you anyway I can."

Tobin pulled her hand until she stepped to him. He wrapped her in a tight hug, and was startled when for the first time since reaching Korriban he felt tears streaming down his cheeks. The tears washed down his face, and the tension in his chest suddenly erupted into sobs so powerful they stole the strength from his knees. He collapsed to the ground, even while Klinti continued to hold him. She sat down with him, and said nothing as the wave of grief swept over him. He cried for his mother and for Valus. A part of him, he knew, cried for the future he would not be able to have with her.

He couldn't say how long the fit lasted, but when at last the sobs stilled and the tears stopped flowing, he leaned back and studied Klinti. Her veil had slipped off and her face was just inches from his. Her smile was gentle and sad, and she was just as beautiful as ever.

Their lips touched, and then melded together for the longest time. Slowly she lifted a finger to her lower lip, where the last of Tobin's tears lingered. "Wherever our paths may lead us," she whispered, "I will still love you."

"And I will always love you," Tobin said. She leaned toward him this time, and all conversation, all grief, and thoughts of the future, were lost in an all too brief explosion of joy.

On a forgotten deck of an ancient ship, two lost souls made plans for the future.

Tobin Solo Fel Artin, last repository of all the knowledge and power of both the Jedi and Sith, sat cross-legged on the deck across from the Miraluka pirate named Klinti, and discussed their options. Their clothes hung disheveled from their shoulders where they had hastily redressed.

The first, most obvious limitation was Tobin's initial idea of trying to take command of the star destroyer itself. "You could kill Zabrak and Aleusa and all the rest of the command crew," Klinti told him as they talked far into the night cycle, "but it wouldn't matter. There are only a handful of Unitarians on board. The crew wouldn't follow you because you haven't proven yourself. It doesn't matter how powerful you are, you can't do everything yourself."

Tobin nodded. "That makes sense. So trying to take command would be a mistake, but I can't stay either. The Zabrak wants me dead, as does Aleusa. So I need to get off this ship. I have no credits and I have no contacts, and I need some way to challenge the Emperor himself. How do I go about becoming a pirate?"

"You go to the Rings, of course," Klinti said.

"The Rings?"

She nodded to herself. "Of course, you never knew. I forget how young you were, Tobin. The ship rarely went there because it was so big, but Zabrak and your mother often did. The Rings is the largest of the free trade outposts in the Corporate Sector. That's where privateers go to recruit new crew, and that's where aspiring captains go to get their own ships."

"Do you know the coordinates?"

"I do. Better than that, Zabrak is going to be recruiting to replace his raiding party losses. He's going to be going in the next day or two. He takes me because I can see sometimes if someone is going to be trouble or not."

Tobin nodded as plans started swirling in his head. "Does he take guards?"

"Always."

Tobin studied her closely. She was beautiful, with their recent coupling she seemed to glow to both his eyes and the Force. He wanted to protect her. If the Zabrak found out she was helping him… "Will you come with me?"

Klinti became perfectly still, as he remembered her doing during his last tenure on the ship. It was a response to pressure or stress, possibly genetically programmed. He could not even see her breathing as she pondered the question.

Finally, she spoke: "The Zabrak and Aleusa would not let me go willingly. I've assumed most of the daily administration of the ship, and my 'gifts' have benefited them in getting the right people in the right positions."

Tobin leaned forward and took her hand in his. "Klinti, would you come with me?"

Her fingers closed around his. "If I can, I will."

"I may not be able to do everything at once," Tobin said, "but this I can do—I will protect you. While you are with me, no one will touch you."

"You would kill for me?" From another woman's lips, that would sound like a gushing hope. From Klinti it was almost a dirge. And yet…

"While on Korriban, I studied with the last Sith Lord. He taught me that all life has a price, and that sometimes the value of the life you are faced with is less than the value of your need to take it. Your life is the highest value I know. If you are in danger, I would kill the universe to save you. But I will never kill needlessly, like Zabrak."

Klinti bowed her head, but did not let go of his hand. "Then I will come with you."


	10. A New Life

**Chapter Ten: A New Life**

For the next few days Tobin played the part of Carhhk the Ubese. He went where he was expected to go and did what he was expected to do. He had his own room, though it was little more than a closet, because of the Ubese environmental conditions. He rigged the system to provide baseline human atmosphere while continuing to report the more hydrogen and carbon dioxide-rich atmosphere of the Ubese. With the voice modulator built into the Ubese helmet, there was no danger of anyone recognizing his voice. The Ubese were known not to be good conversationalists, so few bothered talking to him other than to issue orders.

At night Tobin sent out tendrils of thought to Zabrak, urging him to take the Ubese Carhhk with him to the Rings.

On the morning of the fourth day, he received a com signal to report to the starboard hangar bay. Tobin complied immediately, dressed as always in his Ubese suit and helmet.

The Zabrak and Aleusa both stood by a drop shuttle with a small party of mixed pirates, both raiders and civilians. Klinti stood next to Aleusa wearing something strange on her face. They appeared to be blast goggles, but were narrow and contoured to her face. They looked very fetching and completely hid the fact she was Miraluka. She turned her head as Tobin walked in just as if she were watching him with real eyes.

"Carhhk, took you long enough," Zabrak growled.

"I still don't know why you bothered," Aleusa said as they turned and walked into the shuttle. The civilian leader of the ship looked unchanged, save for a few more wrinkles around her eyes and mouth. "You had other guards."

The Zabrak shrugged and made a non-committal grunt as he and the rest climbed on board the shuttle. The two leaders and Klinti went to a forward compartment while the rest of the party stayed in the larger rear compartment. They settled back in their seats as the shuttle launched and immediately went to hyperspace.

The voyage lasted less than an hour. They emerged near a tightly clustered asteroid belt of some kind. Only as they approached did Tobin see through the nearest porthole that rather than asteroids, he was staring at the shattered remnants of a dead planet. Lacing through these rocks were two giant rings, so large in fact they themselves had the circumference of a small moon.

This place was easily large enough for Klinti and he to lose themselves.

The shuttle entered one of literally thousands of bays that dotted the surface of the lower ring. The ring itself was easily a kilometer thick and hundreds of kilometers in diameter. The second ring was perhaps two or more kilometers above the first, connected by a series of thick spokes. As they approached, Tobin could see through the port windows as tiny lights flashed up and down the spokes.

The shuttle landed in its berth and the crew quickly disembarked. Without a word Zabrak took off through the landing bay entrance and the others followed. They emerged into an incredible sight. The interior of the rings was terraformed. Where Tobin expected dark, cramped halls he found instead a curving valley with a narrow, bright blue stream running through fields filled with verdant, growing things. The walls of the rings, though, were another thing. Level after level rose up like the walls of a thousand-meter deep canyon. Lifts shot up and down each level, and running along the outer rim of each level were bi-directional maglev trains. Every few hundred meters, a skywalk stretched between the ring walls, throwing shadows down on the verdant valley, or support struts providing additional surface area for businesses and residents alike. Along the entire length was a strip of light perfectly emulating the natural sunlight of the system.

It was the most incredible place he had ever seen, and nothing like what he imagined a pirate base to be.

They walked along the edge of the valley to one of the lifts and shot up. Tobin found it hard to tear his eyes from the valley floor as the glass-enclosed lift tube shot them up to the 253rd level.

They walked along a wide promenade, open to the fresh air that circulated through the ring. Shops of every description lined the walkway, with people of all races and professions sold or bought goods from across the galaxy. He understood now why Klinti called it a free trade outpost, rather than a pirate base. These were not pirates, but people just trying to live as best they could outside the Empire's control.

"There's Hershied's agent," Aleusa said.

The party slowed as they came even with the entrance of a large restaurant. The agent was a young Chiss looking with unusual intensity at a menu on the restaurant's window. Zabrak turned the guards. "Everyone stay in this sector and keep your coms on. Chartris, you're with me. We'll go down to the docks after."

The Echani pirate, among the first Tobin ever saw when their own cruiser was boarded years ago, adjusted his bulging weapons belt and followed the two leaders into the restaurant.

The other guards did not even look at each other as they turned and went their own ways. Tobin watched the direction most were going, and chose the opposite direction. Klinti discreetly followed a few moments later.

Tobin became aware almost immediately of a presence shadowing not him, but Klinti. It was a Rodian, one of Zabrak's inner circle or raiders. The creature did not even bother hiding its intent of watching Klinti, and Klinti made no show of being aware of him. However, through the Force Tobin knew she saw him as clearly as she saw everything else around her.

_What is his name_? Tobin thought as firmly as he could.

He heard her mind's whispering answer. _Sleedo_.

Tobin turned around abruptly and walked back until he bumped into the Rodian. "Sleedo," he said. "Sorry."

"Watch it, Ubes-_a,_" the Rodian said in Huttese.

"You must be tired," Tobin said.

The Rodian's dark, huge eyes took on a glassy sheen as Tobin pushed the compulsion on him. "I am," Sleedo said. "You watch the girl. Boss's orders."

"I will," Tobin promised.

Sleedo stumbled through the crowd until he reached a bench between a brothel and a wine house. He laid down on the bench and quickly fell asleep.

Instantly Klinti was there. She took her small com unit from a pocket in her slacks and slipped it into Sleedo's belt. Tobin followed his example. "Our best bet is to get to one of the nodes," she said. "Come on."

Suddenly the coms erupted in a loud screech. Sleedo shot upright as the sound jarred the sleeping compulsion from his mind. The Zabrak's voice burst through the two coms and Sleedo's own. "Klinti's dumped her com unit! Where is she?"

Sleedo stood when he saw Klinti and Tobin standing nearby. His hand went for his blaster. "What's going on here?"

Tobin dashed forward and struck Sleedo with an open palm to his chest. The Rodian crumbled. "We've got to go," Klinti said. To the incapacitated Sleedo, she said, "Tell the Zabrak that I've decided to exercise my right to leave. And tell Aleusa that I'm sorry."

The Rodian managed a groaning noise in response and watched as his charge and the Ubese he thought was named Carrhk ran away down the promenade. He did finally grab a com and gasped, "Carrhk and Klinti are running!"

The Zabrak roared: "Carrhk? Carrhk! What is that crazy girl thinking? I want everyone there now. Kill that Ubese rat and get Klinti back!"

Halfway to the next lift, pirates came from everywhere. At least twenty of them, making up the majority of the Zabrak's raiding party. Tobin didn't even speculate on how they got there so quickly, unless they were all shadowing Klinti.

"Ring security won't get involved unless there's a death," Klinti said _sotto voce_ to Tobin. "But if they find out you're…"

She didn't need to finish the thought. The prohibition against abnormals was so ingrained in society that even here among the rejects Tobin and Klinti would be in danger.

Tobin kept his lightsabers safely hidden with his holocron inside the Ubese encounter suit and prepared to fight twenty men by himself. The first to attack was a human, followed by a Chagrian and two more Rodians. Tobin shot forward and slid at the last minute, kicking out the man's feet and throwing him over in a hard landing on his back.

Tobin kicked up from the floor and got a Rodian in the mouth, then spun and swept the legs from another attacker. He moved in a blur and shut out all awareness but the threats the Force told him about. Blasters fired but Tobin anticipated the aim and dodged them before fingers even pressed the trigger. Knifes and vibroblades slashed at him, but he turned fluidly away from the threats, disarmed the attackers and put them on their backs.

His final attacker backed away to get better aim with his blaster, only to receive a blow to the back of the head. As he crumbled onto the promenade, Klinti let the lifted blaster drop. Inside his mask, Tobin grinned, then dashed forward and took her hand. The patrons of the stores facing the fight went back to their wares, food or drinks without further commotion. Fights were not uncommon, and no one died.

The two quickly found a lift and soared up from that level to one another fifty levels up. They walked quickly down the seemingly endless promenade to another lift, and then dropped ten floors. Finally, Klinti led Tobin toward a maglev train car. They boarded with dozens of others and took a seat near the back.

Klinti took a deep breath. "That was almost fun," she whispered shakily, "if I knew they didn't want to kill us both now."

Tobin took her hand. "I will not let that happen."

After a few minutes of travel through the ring, Tobin asked, "Where are we going?"

"The nearest node. The nodes are the planetary remnants," Klinti explained. They came to yet another stop to drop-off or load new passengers. "This planet was destroyed during the Vong invasion. It was known as Sernpidal once."

Tobin tried to imagine the destructive power necessary to crack a planet apart but could not. Through the front canopy of the maglev he saw a rocky outcrop ahead. From the valley floor it looked as if a mountain rose from its midst. They drove into the rock, and in moment emerged in a massive cavern with what looked like…

"A lake?"

"An ocean, almost," Klinti confirmed. "This was a water-rich planet before its destruction. When the Corporate Sector authority first commissioned construction of the Rings, harvesters started collecting the hydrogen dioxide scattered throughout the system. They gathered it in the planetary remnants since the mass was considered dangerous for the early stages of construction."

The maglev stopped and the two disembarked with the rest of the passengers. The air felt moist and pleasantly warm. Overhead, massive light strips made the cavern shine with artificial daylight, just like the rings. The massive lake stretched for as far as Tobin could see, once more impressing on him just how amazing the Rings were.

"The cavern was expanded as raw materials were used for the construction of the first ring," Klinti said. She took his arm, and the two walked casually down a path along the edge of the water. Below, he saw different beings playing in the water, including a scattering of Mon Calamari.

"This provides the fresh water for the whole facility?"

Klint nodded. "The rings are a self-contained eco-system. The rings grow their own food. That lake has a variety of fish that are harvested for food stuffs. There are herds of nerf and bantha, and flocks of edible fowl.

They continued walking for the longest time until they came to a hostel. "There is nothing to do but lay low and wait," she said. "I know there is a Unitarian Sect here, but I think it would be safer to wait before we try to contact them." She handed Tobin a small stack of dark metallic chips. "Imperial credits. Even here in the free outpost, we can't completely escape the Empire. One should be enough for a week's stay. It's everything I have."

Tobin nodded. He stepped to the front desk and registered with the droid manning the station under a false name. The droid did not ask for any form of identification, and payment was in advance.

A few minutes later Klinti casually walked into the lobby and made a point of looking away from the security cameras until she reached Tobin. The two continued to their room, and settled in. The room held only a single bed, with a holovid and a small window looking out over the artificial ocean.

Only then did she take a long, shuddering breath. She let her veil drop, exposing the shadows that would be eyes in anyone else's face. "Tobin," she whispered in a small voice, "did we do it?"

Tobin knelt down on the floor before her, looking up at that beautiful, mysterious face. Without eyes, he found himself keying off the line of her lips. The way her cheeks crinkled when she smiled, or the way her lips pursed when she was worried. He reached up and gently caressed one of her cheeks.

"I don't feel any immediate danger in the Force," he said.

"So we did it," she whispered.

"I think so."

She leaned down with unerring aim and latched her lips to his. His whole body thrummed at the contact. When at last they parted, she smiled. "Tell me you love me."

"I love you."

"Will you show me?"

Tobin nodded as he began to pull off her blouse. "I will."

Tobin and Klinti spent five days together doing absolutely nothing except enjoying each other's company. They hardly left their room at all—taking meals in private. The only time they left was to walk down to the water for a swim. It was not a unique thing for Tobin—he swam in the oceans of Nalderaan—but it had been ten years ago. However, being raised in a ship, Klinti had never before submersed herself in a natural body of water.

Granted, the Node ocean was not entirely natural, but it was as natural as an ocean located within a remnant of a shattered planet could be. She made a point of keeping her shades on even as she and Tobin walked into the gentle surf.

The rotation of the rings was sufficient to produce tides, but they were gentle. Tobin allowed the natural salty buoyancy of the water to carry both he and Klinti out from the coast.

"Are you sure of this?" Klinti asked. The water was quite deep.

"I won't let anything happen to you," he assured her. He kept her hand in his, and with a gentle nudge of the Force sent them drifting lazily back to the beach.

She wore a black one-piece suit that accentuated her curvy figure. Tobin found himself staring at her hungrily, even after she splashed him with a playful smile. "You need to smile more, Tobin," she told him as they cuddled on the beach after their swim. "You can't be so serious all the time."

"I don't know how," he admitted.

"You used to smile for me on the ship."

"That was before Korriban," Tobin pointed out.

"Was it really so bad?"

"There were hard lessons to learn," Tobin admitted. "I think I forgot to smile while I was there."

"You'll have to learn again." She maintained her own smile, but she sounded more serious. "Whichever path you take, you're going to have to learn how to smile at people. To put people at ease. I'm sure you could make everyone fear you, but there may be a time when you need people to trust you as well. Or even follow you. Try humor. Try smiling."

He leaned over and thoroughly kissed her. "You're going to have to show me how," he told her.

"I will," she promised. "There's something else, though."

"What?"

"There's a sect here," she said.

Tobin found himself scanning the beach to see if anyone was within hearing distance. "I remember you mentioning it. A Unitarian sect, right?"

Klinti nodded. "Remember I used to come here with Aleusa and the Zabrak all the time? One of the sect members recognized what I was. To them I'm Force-blessed, even if only a little. Eventually they led me to their temple. There's a large community here, almost a thousand or more. They have a few contacts—the temple might be able to help us find a berth on a ship."

Tobin thought about it. While swimming, he kept his sect necklace in his robes, but he still had it from the morning after he healed the little Togruta half-breed girl. "Will I get them in trouble?" he asked.

"I do not think so," Klinti said. "I think you would be an affirmation of their faith."

Tobin said nothing as he laid down on the black sand of the beach. Above, he could see the illuminator that lit the whole cavern. It ran on a track to give the impression of a diurnal cycle that matched that of the tings. Not it was approaching the far side of the cavern and would eventually switch into a dull blue lunar cycle. The lunar cycle was for the fish, which were mostly transplanted from a system with a single moon.

"Tobin?" Klinti's hand rested on his bare chest, and she pulled on leg over his as she melted herself to him. "Tell me what you're thinking?"

"The task before me," he admitted. "An impossible task taught to me by a dead Dark Lord of the Sith. I don't know if I can do it."

"All things are possible through the Force," she whispered into his ear. The sensation caused his hairs to rise. "Does this tickle you?" she whispered again.

He cringed away. Klinti propped herself up on her elbow. Though she had no eyes, he knew she could see him. "Tobin," she said. "Are you still ticklish? After all you've been through."

"I am not," Tobin said quickly.

Her hand started creeping up his ribs. It took a Jedi meditation to keep from jumping, but he could not stop the flush of blood to his face. Klinti's smile turned downright evil as she leaned forward, placed her lips on his ribcage, and then blew a raspberry so loud everyone on the beach could hear.

The startled laugh surprised Tobin as much as it surprised Klinti, but the Sith in him would not let such an affront stand without punishment. He had learned over the last few days that Klinti was very ticklish, and set to her with a vengeance that left her gasping for breath. Most of the others on the beach simply dismissed the scene as two young lovers enjoying each other's company.

Which for that moment was exactly what they were.

When they checked the docking register and confirmed that the Zabrak was well and truly gone, Tobin and Klinti risked leaving the Node for the first time since their arrival. They had enough credits to last perhaps another month, but neither had any desire to wait until their last bit of money to seek other opportunities.

They caught an elevator tram for a small fee and left the first ring entirely to go to the second.

The two rings were very similar. Like the first, the second, inner ring had a terraformed floor at least through the two thirds of it that were completed. However, where the first ring was comprised almost wholly of businesses, docks and administrative offices, the second ring was comprised mostly of housing, with only the occasional shop open for the convenience of the twenty million people who inhabited the structure.

Klinti led Tobin unerringly through the many residential sectors. Below, he could see people moving along the floor of the valley, enjoying the picturesque quality of the grassy terrarium below.

Finally, they reached the end of the finished section of the second ring. They encountered a massive wall that simply bisected the whole ring to keep the air in. On the corridor they followed, the wall contained a single door.

"There are a few useable structures beyond the wall," Klinti explained. "The new construction is actually on the other side of the unfinished section, but it's going slow. They don't open up a new section until there is sufficient demand, since it's so expensive."

She knocked on the door and the two waited.

A few moments later, the door opened and they found themselves looking down at a little girl. A little girl with long, exposed nasal slits, thin, near reptilian lips and yellow eyes set amidst a dark gray face and black hair.

The child was a Vong. "Can I help you?" she asked in courteous Basic.

Klinti knelt down to the child and pulled a necklace out from under her shirt. Like Tobin, she also wore the sign of a Unitarian. "I wished to see the Padawai of this sect," she answered simply. "My name is Klinti. When I was here last, Kenth was Padawai."

The little girl's eyes widened. "Be right back," she said quickly before disappearing. The door closed.

"They have to be careful who they let in," Klinti explained. "All new members must be vouched for by at least two older members."

"And me?"

"You have the Force."

The door opened a moment later and a large, muscular man appeared. He looked to be in his late forties with thinning blond hair and brown eyes set in an angular, strong face. He appeared to be a human at the height of physical conditioning.

"Klinti?" he asked.

"Hello, Kenth," Klinti said with a warm smile. "It is good to see you."

Kenth blinked at her for a long moment. "You look happy. Is something wrong?"

The Miraluka laughed. "Not wrong, so much. Kenth, please meet Tobin S'Artin. Tobin, this is Kenth Shandor, the Padawai of this Sect."

Kenth's eyes narrowed at the use of the title so openly, but they widened again as the name seemed to ring a bell. "Tobin S'Artin? Were you on Nalderaan ten years ago, by chance?"

Tobin nodded. "With my mother."

He turned back to Klinti. "Do you vouch for him?"

"He is Force-blessed, Kenth," she said. "More than blessed. My Sight tells me this. He is the last trained Jedi."

Tobin opened his mouth to contest this, but chose not to. Instead, he let the muscular man lead the two past the door and into what could only be described as a temple.

Unlike the small cabin on Nalderaan, the Unitarian Sect on the Ring owned a ware-house sized amount of space built against the vacuum of the unfinished rings. Though it had a certain utilitarian air about it, the space alone was impressive. Instead of a few wooden pews, the space held hundreds of metal pews spread out of a hemispherical shape centering on a raised platform. Over the platform they could see a large Unitarian sigil hanging from a chain and back-lit.

"This has grown a lot," Klinti noted.

"So has our participation," he said. "We number in the thousands now, and have sent brothers and sisters out to begin missions on other worlds."

"For what purpose?" Tobin asked.

Kenth studied the young man closely for a moment before he said, "The Empire is committing a terrible sin of hubris. They are killing the Force-blessed by the hundreds every year. This has to stop. The only hope we have is to increase our numbers until our voices are loud enough that the Empire cannot ignore us any more."

Tobin nodded—it was a good, if rather naïve—dream. More likely the Emperor would simply start killing them en masse as a threat to the vaunted Pax Galactica.

Though the vast worship chamber was empty, but Tobin could sense many beings just out of sight behind the back wall. Kenth led them through the pews to a door that slid open upon their approach.

On the other side they found offices and meeting rooms; they saw a playroom filled with several children and a kitchen large enough to prepare very large meals. The people were in a large room at the very back of the structure. Kenth led them inside what looked like a classroom with several foam chairs arrayed in a circle where perhaps thirty people spoke together.

As Kenth led Tobin and Klinti into the room, one of the participants screamed. The whole room fell silence as this person closed her mouth and stood, staring at Tobin with sea green eyes.

"Tobin," she said. Tears began to pour down her cheeks. "By the Force, it's you, isn't it?" She leaned forward in a pleading pose, unconsciously exposing blue cleavage and allowing her lekku to spill over her shoulders.

Tobin remembered another classroom many light years away. "Soola Dayaala," he whispered.

His former teacher—the person who saved the life of he and his mother—stumbled out of the stunned circle and rushed to him. Rather than hug him, though, she collapsed to the floor at his feet and wrapped his legs in a desperate hug.

Stunned by the display, Tobin knelt down quickly before her. "Soola?"

She looked up at him, sobbing now. "They found us," she gushed. "After you left, somehow they found us. They killed Tam and my husband. The rest barely escaped. We came here."

Her pain was like a knife and he instantly moved to shunt her emotion aside. Then he felt a hand on his shoulder and looked up at Klinti. He knew Darth Valus would tell him to ignore this creature. Her life had no value in his ultimate task.

And yet it was because of her that he and his mother escaped Nalderaan.

With sudden confidence, Tobin sat down on the floor, pulled the distraught woman onto his lap, and sent a cool wave of Force energy into her mind.

She felt it and stiffened at first, gasping. "What are you…."

"I can't change what has happened," he told her, "but in the Force there is healing. There is peace. Let me share that with you."

The others in the room watched as Soola nodded her head and sank into what appeared to be a deep nap. A moment after, Tobin slowly stood up with the woman in his arms. He did so from a lotus-position without the use of his arms. It should not have been possible, and Kenth Shandor at least realized that.

"She's sleeping now," Tobin told him. "When she wakes, she will feel better."

"Will she remember?" Kenth asked.

"She saved my mother and me," Tobin said. "To remove her memory of pain, I would have to remove the memories of her happiness. I would never do that to her. But when she wakes, she will be at peace with her pain. Still, she needs a place to sleep."

One of the other members of the discussion circle stood. He, like Kenth, was a man with thinning hair, only his was already gray. His eyes were blue. He didn't have the same bulk as Shandor, but he appeared strong and healthy for his age.

"My name is Shindo Bard, Force-Blessed," he said. "I'll take her."

"Thank you," Tobin said as he handed his former teacher over.

"You are the Jedi she saved," Kenth said.

"My mother was the Jedi she saved," Tobin said as they watched Bard and Soola disappear through another door.

"Is she with you?"

"She died on Korriban when the Imperials found us."

Kandor sucked in his breath. "Korriban? Our legends say it is the source of all evil in the galaxy. That the Sith were spawned there."

"It's a long story," Tobin said. "And one I will tell you soon enough. But for now, Klinti and I need your help."

Shandor shrugged. "If it is ours to provide, then it will be yours to take. Tell us what you need, young Force-blessed."


	11. Force Blessed

**Part II: The Pirate**

**Chapter Eleven: Force-Blessed**

The temple bristled with a good three thousand people. Tobin watched from a side office through a transparent wall. The people came from all walks of life in the Rings. Though it was officially outside the Empire, the Rings had their own social strata just like any other civilization.

The administrators were considered the top of society. They were comprised of former Corporate Sector barons mostly, though some had risen up through the ranks due to the meritocracy the rings purported to use. Next came the larger shipping magnets, followed by other business owners and then finally the workers and refugees.

He did not spot any barons in the temple, but he could see one or two shipping magnets from the quality of their clothes, and many business owners.

Then he heard Kenth Shandor begin to speak.

"Welcome, brothers and sisters in the Force," he began.

"Welcome," the audience intoned.

Tobin closed his eyes before the power of the unified response. "You feel it, don't you?" Klinti whispered be his side. "I was so scared the first time I came here. But then I felt that, and knew I would be back whenever I could."

Tobin nodded. "I never imagined that non Force-sensitives to make such an impact."

"One voice is weak. A thousand are mighty," she answered.

Out in the temple, Shandor said, "Pray with me now, Brothers and Sisters: There is no emotion."

"_There is peace_," came the unified response.

"There is no ignorance."

"_There is knowledge_."

"There is no passion."

"_There is serenity_."

"There is no death."

"_There is the Force_."

"The Jedi Code?" Tobin whispered. "How could they even know it?"

"The Empire tried to wipe all traces of the Jedi out," Klinti explained, "but some things survived. Just like you. Hiding in secret until the time was right."

Outside, Shandor had begun his sermon in depth. "What do these words mean, by Brothers and Sisters? There is no emotion. How can this be true? Even in those stories we retain, we know that the Jedi themselves had great emotion. We ourselves feel it every day. In the slights that are made against us. For the threats we face for our Faith. So how can the Jedi of old claim there is no emotion?

"The truth is far more powerful than what the words alone seem to say. The Jedi do not truly believe there is no emotion. Rather, they teach us that true peace can never be achieved without understanding and facing those emotions. How can any of us be at peace when we are raging against the injustices of the galaxy? How can any of us know peace when our love of another drives us to distraction? We cannot. So the Jedi teach us to face those feelings. Face them, and understand them. All beings gave emotions. But if you can understand your emotions and accept they are a part of you, then you can achieve a sense of peace both with yourself and your place in the Force.

"This is true for all the tenants of the prayer, but most especially for the last. There is no death, there is the Force. All of us have lost ones we loved. All of us. The pain of that loss is almost unbearable. Yet, just as we can find peace by understanding and accepting that pain, so too can we find peace knowing that those we love have not truly left us. For all of us came from the Force, and all of us will return to the Force. It is from the Force that all life flows, and knowing that, we know that our loved ones will always be with us. They are with us now."

His words had a visible effect on the audience, and even on Tobin himself. He had never thought of the Force as a religion. For him, it was less a faith to accept as it was a fact to observe. But for these people who did not have the Force, it was an act of faith to even believe it existed.

"The Force has blessed us today," Shandor told them. "Six years ago, our dear sister Soola Dayaala was forced to flee her home after Imperial officials raided and killed many in her sect. She told us all she had befriended the last Jedi, Jalia S'Artin, and her son Tobin. That Jalia had admitted that her son was born not of a man's seed but of the Force itself. That he was in fact the Chosen One prophesized by the Jedi thousands of years before. But we lost word of the two. Until yesterday. My Brothers and Sisters, the Force-blessed child of the last Jedi, Tobin S'Artin, has come to us. He has already shown us the true meaning of the prayer by bringing peace to our sister Soola, easing the loss that has haunted her these many years. And he has come to speak to us this day. Tobin?"

Tobin stepped out of the door with his lightsabers hanging from his belt, and saw Kenth Shandor on the raised podium waiting for him. Klinti followed a step behind, but more slowly. She remained just off the platform.

The effect his appearance had on the audience was electrifying, and their attention energized Tobin as well. There was true power in those eyes, he realized—a power unlike anything either of his masters had taught him.

He stepped onto the podium. "Let the Force guide your words and you'll be fine," Shandor advised with simple optimism. Tobin nodded before turning and found himself facing more people than he had ever faced before. Out of desperation more than anything else, his eyes searched until he found Soola. She was still a beautiful woman, he saw. Perhaps not like his Klinti, but beautiful. She looked up at him with an expression of adoration that was both terrifying, and if were honest with himself, exhilarating.

"I am alive today because of Soola Dayaala," he began. "When I was ten, my mother and I were found out and the Empire came for us. We escaped, but had no means of leaving the planet. It was Soola and the Nalderaan sect that got us off the planet. I cannot thank you enough, Soola, for what you did, nor can I tell you how deeply I grieve with you for your loss."

Soola was crying now.

"The Nalderaan sect also gave me another gift. A Jedi holocron. I have leaned much from it over the years, and am ever thankful to have it."

He stepped away from the podium and examined them all. "Until my fourteenth birthday, I was trained as a Jedi. We lived among the pirates, seeking shelter like so many of you. But everyone here knows that pirates often kill to live. Some of you are pirates yourselves—I can see it. For those of us who are attuned to the Force, we can feel death. My mother and I, and my dearest friend Klinti there whom you know, could feel every victim the Zabrak killed. And when he wiped out a colony ship and fifty thousand died, it proved too much. My mother gave into her emotion, and we lost our peace. We had to flee."

Tobin took a deep breath, wondering if they were ready for his story. "We sought shelter on the only world the Empire dared not approach. We went to the home of the Sith. We went to Korriban."

The name caused a gasp among the crowd. "There, I met Darth Talus, who like my mother, was the last of his kind. The last Dark Lord of the Sith."

He saw them leaning forward now, raptly listening.

"What I tell you now may not agree with the teachings you have learned. For you have learned that there was ever the dichotomy of the Force. There was only the Light side. There was only the Dark side. And forever the two would be in conflict. To be one precluded being the other. And yet, it is because of that conflict that the Empire hunts us down and murders us as infants. It is fear of yet another war that will span the galaxy. And I can understand that fear. It was to face this fear that the Force guided us to Korriban, and it was for that reason that the last Sith did not try to fight us. Rather, he joined us. And he trained me in his ways while my mother continued to train me in hers. However, in time, the Zabrak betrayed us to the Empire.

"Just three weeks ago, my mother and Darth Talus perished. We killed between the three of us close to five hundred attackers both of Zabrak's men and Imperial troopers, but as we all well know, not even Sith and Jedi are impervious from harm. But let me tell you, Brothers and Sisters, the last Sith did not fall cursing his enemy. He fell while defending my mother, while I fought elsewhere. He gave his life so that she could have enough time to say goodbye to me. He gave his life because of his love for her."

He had them now, Tobin realized with a sense of shock. These people were his now. He sat down on the edge of the podium, but used the Force to ensure they could all hear. "For you see, unlike the Jedi, the Sith reveled and drew power from their emotions. Mostly throughout history it was rage and hatred. But just like Jedi, the Sith could also love. It was often a selfish love, but it was love nonetheless. It was his love for my mother that spurred his action, and it was mother's love for me that spurred hers. And between them they have produced one who is neither Jedi nor Sith, but rather both. I have become an Avatar of the Force. I am both its will and its determination. Its will is for the Force to be ascendant. And its determination is for the slaughter of its children to cease."

"Save them!" someone cried from the audience.

"I will," Tobin said. "And so will you. Kenth Shandor told me that your goal is to raise enough voices to call for change. If you accept it, I would rather give you another task. One that is just as dangerous, but more immediately so. My ultimate task is to change the system. It is the goal the Force has given me. But in the short term, the goal I would offer you is not to change the system, but to cheat it. Save the children by any means necessary. Monitor the postings. I understand each world is required to list midichlorian counts publicly. If you see a child in danger, kidnap them. Remove them from danger. Hide them. Fake tests. Do everything you can in or out of the law to save those children. In time, I will train them. A new generation of Force-blessed will arise. A generation that is neither Sith nor Jedi, but rather the unification of the two. You call yourselves Unitarians? I tell you that is exactly what you are. It is what I am. It is what the Force itself wills. The Unified Force stands before you, and calls you to raise your voices and your hearts. The slaughter of the innocents must end. And though the Force is with me, it is with you as well, because I cannot do it alone. Will you accept this task? Will you heed the call of the Force?"

Their answering cry was like the roar of a starship engine lifting off from the planet surface. The wall of sound washed over Tobin, strengthening him in a way he could never have imagined. He stood and simply closed his eyes, absorbing the sound of their cries.

It was Shandor at his side who said, over the cries, "I know it is not the Code, but they could use a sign. Show them the Force, my friend."

Yes, Tobin realized. A little theater could go a long way.

He stepped off the podium onto the air, and stayed there. The roar turned to gasps and cries not of fear, but of hope. Tobin could feel it within all of them and knew that Shandor was absolutely right. These people needed more than words—they needed a sign of hope. And as he stood levitating before them, they finally had it. An affirmation of faith, just like Klinti said.

He had the seeds laid. Not it was time to gather the soil to make the seeds grow.

/\/\/\/\

"It is a path that will take years," Tobin said to the small group of sect leaders. "And I cannot accomplish it alone."

"Nor would you have to," Shandor assured him. "What is your next step?"

Tobin looked at Klinti. Her head was bowed, but he could sense she was 'looking' at him through the Force. "For now, we need to get a ship of our own. We need credits—more than we can hope to get just by working. We're going to need ships. And a world to operate out of. And people who believe and can do what we need. But the first step is a ship."

"We have credits," Shandor said, "but not that many."

"Nor would I ask it of you," Tobin said. Heeding Klinti's Force nudge, he smiled. "I was serious when I spoke in the temple. I want you to use the resources of all the sects to save those children. That's where your credits should be going."

Across from Shandor sat Shindo Bard. When Tobin mentioned pirates, Shindo was among those he included. Though the man was certainly not a murderer, Tobin sensed from him that he was not a law-abiding imperial citizen. "So where would you begin to get a ship?"

"By starting where everyone else does," Tobin said. "I need a berth on a pirate ship myself. Preferably one that does not actively murder its victims."

Next to Shindo, Soola grinned happily. "That sounds like your captain, Shindo!"

Tobin quirked a brow, but it was Klinti who spoke. "You're on the _Fool's Prize_," she said.

"The Force tell you that?" Bard asked with a touch of awe.

"No, I helped Aleusa keep track of her competition," Klinti grinned. "It took me a moment, but I remembered where I've heard the name Bard before. You're whole family is on the ship, isn't it?"

Bard nodded. "It's not much, but Captain Hal-Aslo is a good man. He makes a point of not hitting heavily populated ships and after three years of flying with him I don't think we've killed but five people. Those were because they tried to kill us first. I know we're the bad guys technically, and I know he tore himself up about them every time, but for our line of work that's unusual."

"He has a good reputation," Klinti confirmed. "Is he one of us?"

"No," Shindo said. "I've tried, but I'm afraid to push him too hard. He has no love of the Empire, though, and he's tolerant. He knows I'm Unitarian and has never spoken against me."

"Are there any berths on his ship?" Tobin said.

Shindo smiled. "As it happens, yes. One of our gunners ran off with our slicer. They took their earnings and actually went legit on one of the Mid-Rim worlds. Taxes and everything."

Tobin looked over at Klinti. "Can you slice a computer?"

"Better than a droid," she said without a trace of boasting. "Why do you think I was Aleusa's assistant even as a girl fresh into my teens?"

Shindo and the others watched the two of them. "Should I tell him you're together?"

"We are together," Tobin said clearly.

"It makes sense," Shandor said with a impish grin. "Why wouldn't two of the last Force-blessed kids in the galaxy find each other? I can see you make each other happy. I'm glad you have that companionship."

Tobin took Klinti's hand. "I am too."

/\/\/\/\

Captain Jine Hal-Aslo looked young and hungry. He walked into the bar with an angry swagger and a gleam in his eye. Shindo pointed him out immediately to Tobin and Klinti, and the three watched as he made his way up to the bar and ordered a drink. A step behind him came a Selonian wearing a low-slung space vest that dangled two long, dangerous-looking blasters down around the creature's ribs.

The two eventually made their way to the table. "You Shane Solafel?" he asked as he looked at Tobin. It was the name he and the others agreed to go by.

"I am," Tobin said. "You're Jine Hal-Aslo? I understand you're recruiting."

Jine sat down. The Selonian remained standing by his shoulder, hands near her blasters. "Maybe. Lot's of people are looking. What makes you any better?"

"I am better," Tobin said simply. He nodded back at Klinti and more quietly added, "And I bring a slicer."

The Selonian's bared teeth snapped shut as it looked over Tobin's shoulder. It turned to the Correllan and snapped something in its own language. "Might be useful," the man conceded. "Jine Hal-Aslo, captain of the _Fool's Prize._"

"Shane Solafel. This is Klinti, late of Zabrak's crew. You know Mr. Bard."

Hal-Aslo eyed the Miraluka carefully. "The Zabrak, huh? I think I heard of you. He wasn't too happy you left." He looked at Tobin. "Heard tell the guy with her took out fifty raiders single-handed without a weapon. Zabrak was pretty much trying to take the place apart until they kicked him out yesterday."

"There were only twenty," Tobin said.

The Selonian growled something. "Pretty impressive, kid," the captain said. He looked at Klinti. "Heard you were pretty high up with the Zabrak, and he has the biggest ship out there. What made you leave?"

"They're together," Shindo explained.

"Love birds, huh?" Hal-Aslo muttered. "So, pretty girls aside, I hear a lot of talk, but I ain't actually seen anything myself. You're awfully young to do what I heard tell you did."

Tobin sank into the Force just enough to augment his speed, and in a second stood before the Correllan and Selonian holding both the Selonian's blasters. The creature growled dangerously, but Tobin handed the weapons back handles first.

"Shreei doesn't care for people handling his weapons," Jine said. "Might be considered dangerous."

Tobin nodded. "The Selonians are a strong and honorable people and capable warriors. I honor Shreei even when I say I am better."

Shreei leaned down until its whiskers brushed Tobin's face. "You smell strange, human," she said in a haltering, harsh accent. "You are not normal."

"Who is nowadays?" Tobin asked. "Do I have the job or not?"

"I vouch for him, Captain," Shindo said. "Both of them."

"Fine. You have it for now," Jine said. "Until you screw up, or until Shreei here gets tired of you. We're at bay 753AB, berth number 827. Be there at 1600 hours or you stay here."

"We'll be there," Tobin promised.

/\/\/\/\

Four hours later Tobin and Klinti wandered down the promenade with their things in bags slung over their shoulders. Their clothes were new, as were the spacer bags. They reached the appointed place and saw their new ship for the first time.

"I'm not so excited any more," Klinti muttered.

The ship was a very old freighter, a Correllan AYT-3400 model. It was as large as two drop shuttles and so could carry a modest payload, but it also looked like it was about to fall apart.

A pair of men were working by the entrance, manually lifting crates into the loading ramp. One turned and saw the newcomers. "Hey, Cap, newbies are here!"

Jine Hal-Aslo sauntered down the ramp with the Selonian waddling a step behind. "Punctual," the captain said. "Come on, I'll show you where you're bunking and introduce you to the crew. I'm assuming you don't mind sharing a bunk?"

Tobin felt his cheeks flare, and felt a flash of humorous embarrassment from Klinti. "No, we don't mind," he said, a little too quickly.

Jine chuckled. "Love birds," he said.

They went through the commons area and into the bunks. The hall held eleven rooms, five on each side, and one at the end. Tobin and Klinti both climbed down into the room. It was a little smaller than the room Tobin first shared with his mother on Zabrak's star destroyer.

"Perfect," he said. He stowed his bag and adjusted his belt. The belt now held a blaster, with what appeared to be pair canisters in the back where he stowed his light sabers out of sight.

"Come on, then," Hal-Aslo said.

Back in the common room, they saw the rest of the crew assembled. There were ten of them excluding the captain, mostly human. Aside from the Selonian, and a blue-haired, red-skinned Veltron male, the only other non-humans were a pair of Devaronians, at least that's what Tobin presumed. The male was typically red-skinned with massive protruding horns and sharp fangs that gave him a devilish appearance. However, the female by his side appeared radically different, with thick white fur puffing out from behind her spacer's vest and pants. Her ears swept far back from her face, and her horns were so small as to be mostly hidden behind her hair. Her face was narrower than the male's, more elfish in appearance. She also stood several inches taller even than the horns of the male.

"The Devaronians are the other lovebirds on board," Jine said. "That's Vilmarn Frark and his mate Silmari. She's the boss of the two."

"The Females always are," Silmari said with a confident purr. Beside her, Vilmarn nodded agreeably.

Hal-Aslo nodded to Shindo. "'Course, you know Shindo Bard, a cousin of mine back home. Those are his kids, Haslo and Corra." He nodded to a younger pair. Shindo's son was perhaps a year or two older than Tobin, though his hair was already receding in a race to be as bald as his father. His sister looked close to Klinti's age. Tobin hid his surprise that an entire family would serve on a pirate ship.

"The Veltron is Shon Blue," Jine said. Blue, who was actually quite red, nodded with a happy smile.

Jine then indicated two other Correlians. "This is Hanson Klard, and that's Dek Hastlin. Depending on the time of month or even week, one or the other is courting Corra."

"Not when I'm around," Shindo said ominously.

Everyone laughed, and Tobin began to relax. There was an intimate feeling of camaraderie on board. These people felt like more than a crew. They felt like family.

"Finally, there's Mama Hackstrong, also known as Cindee," he said, nodding to a stout and muscular woman in her forties. "Cindee is my aunt's second cousin."

"Nice to have another girl aboard," Cindee said to Klinti in a gush. "I love those shades of yours."

"Thank you," Klinti said softly.

"So, tell us about yourselves," Shindo said. He spoke with a booming basso voice.

"My name is Shane Solafel. I was a guard on The Zabrak's ship," Tobin lied. "My father taught me Teras Kasi and Echani-style fighting when I was a kid, before he died. I fight very well."

"I'm Klinti. I was third on Zabrak's ship when I met Shane. I…we knew Zabrak wouldn't let me go, so we escaped."

"We heard Zabrak wasn't too happy see you go," Cindee said.

"Heard Shane took out eighty of his men single-handed," Haslo, Shindo's son, said excitedly.

"It was only twenty," Tobin said.

"That's enough for us," Shindo assured him.

"So what's behind those glasses?" Silmari the Devaronian asked. "You don't smell human."

Klinti looked at Tobin quickly, then bowed her head. Tobin looked at Jine, and did not see any danger there. "Klinti is the last of her kind," he said softly. "She is Miraluka. She has no eyes. She sees with the Force."

"An Abnormal?" Cindee said in a neutral tone.

"I am perfectly normal, for a Miraluka," Klinti said with a hint of steel in her voice. "One person is a freak. Fifty million is a race. Until the Empire wiped us out."

"And what about you, Shane?" Jine said. "Shreei said you didn't quite smell right either, and we all know what Shindo does on his shore leave. Are you an Abnormal too?"

"I am," Shane said, letting the Force guide his answer.

The whole crew tensed. "I don't like this," Dek Hastlin said at last. "Not good to have freaks aboard, Jine. It calls too much attention to us."

"Shindo's vouched for them," Jine said. "And 'sides, we already knew about Klinti. Zabrak used to brag about having a blind slicer. He was proud of having an Abnormal working for him. Heck, remember a few years ago when we first got the _Fool's Prize_? Zabrak even claimed to have a Jedi."

Tobin became very still. Shreei noticed immediately and hissed something. Jine turned to his companion, then to Tobin. "That was you?" he asked.

"My mother."

"Was she really a Jedi?" Corra asked.

"She was."

"Are you?"

"No," Tobin said with absolute truth. "I am not Jedi."

"Too bad," Corra said to the shock of her some-time suitors. "Dek, Hanson, who do you think I'm named for?" she said. "It's been four hundred years and yet everyone on Corella knows the name Corran Horn, the Jedi who fought a Vong war master in single-combat to try and save Ithor."

"He destroyed it," Dek said.

"He tried to save it. The politicians blamed him, but everyone knows he won the battle fair and square but the Vong destroyed it anyway."

Dek started to speak, but Jine stilled him with his hand. "I don't care what you are, Shane. All I know is you took out twenty single handed. You can't be all that evil if you've got a pretty girl like that hanging on your arm."

"She can't see how ugly he is," Vilmarn the male Devaronian said. "You humans, it's amazing you have mates at all."

Surprisingly, Klinti laughed. The tension that ran through the crew seemed to dissipate. Tobin stepped forward. "I will take orders, and I will do what I can for this ship. I probably won't be here forever, but while I'm here I'll do my best to be a good member of this crew. And I won't let my being Abnormal endanger any of you. If it comes to that, Klinti and I will leave before any of you get targeted."

"There, feel better, Dek?" Jine said.

Dek glared at Klinti and Tobin, but finally nodded. "Sure, Cap. It's okay."


	12. The Smuggling Run

**Chapter Twelve: The Smuggling Run**

That night, after the ship left the Rings, the captain invited Tobin and Klinti to the cockpit, which protruded between two solar-paneled wings from the front of the otherwise saucer-shaped ship. The cockpit itself was a cramped space with four seats. The small chamber smelled of slightly of stale food and sweat, with an overlay of Sacorran musk.

"Take a seat," Jine said.

Tobin and Klinti took the two rear seats. Tobin sat before what appeared to be a defunct navigation console that was now handled by an automated system, while Klinti sat before a redundant weapons array. From that array Tobin saw that the freighter sported two quad laser cannons on both the top and bottom of the ship, and two jury-rigged turbolaser canons nestled in the front-facing loader prongs. There were also a pair of proton torpedo launchers, but currently the freighter couldn't afford any torpedoes. Rounding out the armament was a single ion cannon mounted just behind the cockpit.

"So, _Shane_," Jine said with a strange emphasis on the name, "let's talk about that run-in you had with the Zabrak."

The emergency bulkhead separating the cockpit from the rest of the ship slid down, effectively ensconcing them in silence.

"What do you want to know?" Tobin asked. He took a deep breath and sank into a mild meditation to calm himself. Shindo vouched for this captain, but Tobin knew there would likely be a handsome reward if the Empire knew he existed. Jine could likely make a lot of money by turning him in.

"You really take on twenty of Zabrak's raiders by yourself?"

"He did," Klinti said. "They were trying to keep us from escaping. Shane saved me."

The fact Tobin didn't answer actually seemed to impress Jine, though Shreei still had a snarl on her face.

"Where'd you learn to fight like that?"

"Mostly on Korriban."

Jine's brows furrowed. "Ain't that a myth. Like Corrella's seven hells?"

"No. I lived there for almost six years."

"Who was your teacher?"

"The last Dark Lord of the Sith," Tobin said calmly.

Jine stared at him for the longest time, then started laughing. "You're having me on!"

"A little," Tobin said with a wry grin. He had enough of a measure of the man to know what he would and would not accept. "My father was actually trained in Echani and Teras Kasi, just like I said before. He raised me to be a coliseum fighter, but then they found out about my mother."

"She was Jedi," Shreei growled. "This Shindo says."

"Yes, my mother was Jedi. She falsified my midichlorian count, but the Empire found out about me when I was ten. She also knew Teras Kasi and made sure I continued to learn after we had to leave my father."

Though Tobin hated to lie, he knew that neither of these beings could accept his true story, nor would they accept someone trained in the Jedi arts on their ship. It was too much of a challenge to their authority, and to a certain extent Tobin could appreciate that. Jine Hal-Aslo was the master of this ship, and it was not fair to him to come aboard and try to threaten that mastery, nor would he as a good captain allow it.

"So what made you want to do this?" Jine finally asked.

"To see the galaxy," Tobin said. "But also to learn the rules of the trade. There can never be a place for either me or Klinti anywhere in the Empire. That leaves only a few professions available to us. If we're ever to have a decent life, then we've got to start somewhere. I'm not just here to serve the ship—I'm here to learn how to run one. And Shindo said you were one of the best captains to learn from."

Tobin watched to see if the praise would be dismissed or not. Though Jine was a practical man, he was young enough to enjoy receiving praise, and he accepted it now as his due, couched as it was through one of his crew members. "I'm not perfect," Jine said with a self-deprecating laugh. "But I care for my people. It's just been a dry run late."

"We are too soft," Shreei said.

"No we aren't," Jine disagreed. "We aren't murderers. There's no need to go killing folks. It just makes the Empire want us even more. Shane, Klinti, I know the Zabrak doesn't like to leave eye-witnesses, but we don't have the will or firepower to start blowing ships out of the stars. We're smugglers and pirates, not murderers."

Tobin shared a long look with Klinti. "That's another reason we wanted to be on this ship," Tobin admitted.

"And one of the reasons I wanted to leave my old one," Klinti said.

"So how do you smuggle if your victims report you to the Imperials?" Tobin asked.

"We got a few tricks up our sleeves," Jine explained. "We have three transponders: one when we steal; one when we trade; and one when we smuggle. And the ship's painted in an electrolyzed liquid polymer. We change colors and patterns. If we board, we're all masked and gloved. No DNA evidence."

"Smart," Klinti admitted.

"Expensive," Shreei barked in its growling accent. "That is why we have no torpedoes."

Jine shrugged. "That and the shipping lists. You know those are the most expensive thing we got in port."

"Shipping lists?" Tobin asked.

"The Corporate Authority insiders sell lists of shipping lanes and cargos. The lists are very expensive, and it's not uncommon for the same list to be sold to three or four different ships."

He tapped a few keys and a hologram of a standard transport ship appeared over the console. "This is a perfect example of why we buy the lists. An automated transport. Not a soul on it. Escorted by a flight of droid fighters. Nemoidians and their droids. It's carrying glitterstims. Refined, saleable glitterstems. The stuff's illegal, so the Empire doesn't know anything about it, and the Traders can't report it. They'll come after us if they find us, but this is the type of cargo we normally hit. It's small, no lives lost, and it gets us a heck of a lot of money."

"What will I be doing?" Tobin asked.

"Gunner. I'll put you in the dorsal quads. Cindee just doesn't like the chair any more."

"Done."

Two days later, the _Fool's Prize_ emerged from hyperspace at a point along the Hydian hyperway. Tobin sat in a reclining chair connected to the quad laser cannons. Unlike the cannons of old, the chair was absolutely stationary. The cannon sights fed through a pair of visors that gave Tobin full field of vision with a targeting reticule to indicate where the lasers would hit.

They waited for nearly three hours before a transport only a little larger than the _Fool's Prize_ dropped out of hyperspace. The transport had droid fighters crawling all over it, catching a lift since none had their own hyperdrives.

Jine gunned the engines and brought the _Fool's Prize_ in at full speed with the ion cannon blasting. Tobin waited for the droid fighters to launch, or for orders to fire on the transport.

It looked like the target was about to jump to safety when Cindee plastered it with another volley of ion cannon fire. The ship started drifting out of control. The droid fighters immediately threw themselves free to attack.

"We have about ten minutes until the freighter reboots and goes to hyperspace," Jine said. "Get those fighters out of my sky."

The whole ship hummed as the quad cannons began firing. Tobin didn't fire at first. The fighters were too far away, too small and too fast. He waited and watched as they came, firing incessantly at the freighter. Closing his eyes, Tobin reached out and felt the fighters. He felt the droid brains guiding them, and the programming that determined their course of action.

He pulled the laser around, eyes still closed, and fired a burst at the spot a droid ship would be in a second. The droid ship obligingly followed its programming to veer starboard from other cannon fire and flew directly into Tobin's firing solution.

"Shane's got the first fighter!" Cindee shouted.

"Corra's got the second!" her brother called.

The ship lurched under the continued assault. Unlike Zabrak's star destroyer, they felt every shot to this freighter. Tobin dismissed the danger and concentrated. He took out the third and then fourth fighter. Haslo Bard took out a fifth, while Corra took out the last one.

"Best damned shooting I've ever seen," Jine crowed. "Let's go get some stims, folks!"

Their first act of piracy proved to be an overwhelming success. That fact seemed to cement Tobin, or Shane, as he was known, and Klinti in with the crew. That night, as they flew back to their broker to unload the stolen stims, they had a jovial dinner with Corellan whiskey flowing in abundance.

Afterward, alone in their bunk, Tobin held Klinti close. "Did we make the right choice?" he asked.

She nodded and held the hands holding her. "We did, for now. I see hints of the path you wish to walk. It's dangerous, and the Unitarians have changed it. Almost as frightening as the ones I first saw for you before. Are you sure this is what you want?" There was pleading in her voice. As she snuggled her body closer to his, he felt the yearning as well.

Yet, the Force whispered in the back of his mind that she was not for him. For now, perhaps, but not in the end. "I go where destiny leads," he said at last.

Klinti said nothing more, and they drifted off to sleep.

The droid transport marked the first of several wildly successful runs for the _Fool's Prize_. They hit one more droid transport before the end of the week, and then boarded and robbed the private yacht of a Muun banker two weeks after that.

The yacht was easy enough to disable. It was only once they boarded that they encountered difficulty—in the form of a large grouping of security personnel. Droids and mercenaries alike. Tobin once more made a difference without overtly using his power. He boarded first in his micron-thick gloves and concealing helmet, rolled faster than the yacht's defenders could follow, and took out two of the sentinel droids before ducking behind the hatch to the rear fresher. He started laying down cover fire that allowed Shreei and Vilmarn to enter. Shindo, Haslo and Jine himself followed.

When the defenders were concentrating on this frontal assault, Tobin deployed one of the three stun grenades Jine gave them for the assault. The organics fell to the floor, and the three remaining droids made easy targets.

"Please don't kill me!" the Muun begged when they dragged him out of the cockpit with the pilot.

Jine and the rest all wore helmets and gloves. The captain pushed the Muun and his Muun pilot into the fresher along with the organic guards. "Don't make a fuss and we won't," the captain said.

Klinti came aboard next and sat down at one of the consoles. She wore a simple mask, along with the gloves. She proved her assertions of being an incredible slicer by immediately hacking into the ship's computer. "He has another ten security droids in the hull," she reported. "Packed and ready for programming. About twenty thousand credits a piece. And what's this?"

Something in her voice made everyone lean closer. Jine did more. He crossed the floor and looked down at the monitor over her shoulder. "By the stars," he whispered. "He's carrying this?"

"He was on his way to a gambling resort," Klinti said with a tight grin. "He wanted to enjoy himself."

"Ten million in credit chips worth of enjoyment," Jine said in awe.

Around him, the crew perked up. "Ten million?" Halso said.

"Yep," Jine said. "We're going to get a helluva a payout from this, people."

As they were loading the packed droids, Jine, Tobin and Shindo went to the lower deck with Klinti in tow. They found the safe behind a wall-sized Muun drapery. "Can you hack that?" he asked Klinti.

She put a hand on the safe and then shook her head. "It's mechanical. Very old, but very effective for this day and age." She touched one of the three knocked knobs. "If we do a wrong combination, it will pull a switch and blow the whole ship. The hinges are internal, so we can't even try cutting them."

"What if we cut through it?" Tobin said.

"We don't have anything that could cut through that," Shindo said. "A laser saw would short itself before we made a dent."

Tobin looked at Klinti for the longest time. "Jine, may I have a word?"

Shindo and Jine exchanged a long look, before the taller man left. When they were alone, the captain said, "What is it?"

Tobin reached behind him to one of the cylinder packs on his belt and removed his mother's lightsaber. Jine studied it closely. "Is that what I think it is?"

Tobin nodded. "The only thing I have from my mother."

Jine considered the sword. "Think it'll go through?"

"Yes."

"Then do it."

Tobin stepped to the safe and lit the blade. He reached out with the Force and felt the hinges inside the reinforced safe. He could have opened the safe with the Force, but he wasn't ready for Jine to know he had that much power. But as the son of a Jedi, his lightsaber would not be as much of a surprise.

He plunged the sapphire blade into the safe all the way to the hilt and slowly moved it up and down. He removed his blade and did the same at a point one meter lower. The whole safe door creaked. He deactivated his blade and replaced it on his belt. With a nod to Jine, the two men pushed the safe door in. It collapsed with a groan of twisted metal and landed with a thud that reverberated through the yacht.

Jine walked to the five stacks of unassuming black chips. "Ten million unmarked chips," he said. "That's the biggest single load we've ever taken."

Tobin nodded. "You chose your target well."

"I'll say. I'll finally be able to pick up a few torps. You know, you and Klinti are going to take a hundred thousand a piece. That's a pretty good chunk, not to mention your percentage of the droid sales. You're probably looking at over a hundred and twenty thousand credits each."

Tobin nodded. Given their new status on the ship, he didn't argue about his low percentages. He had no intention of angering his crew mates. A hundred thousand was enough to buy a small ship of their own, but now wasn't the time.

They docked back at the Rings three days later to sell the droids. Most of the crew went out for a celebration, except Cindee.

"This is a short-lived business," she said when Klinti asked her intentions. "I'm going to go invest my funds."

This shocked Tobin. "Invest it?"

Cindee looked from Tobin to Klinti, and then grinned. "Come on, kids. Maybe you'll learn something."

The no-nonsense pirate matron led them through the rings until she reached… "A bank?" Tobin asked. "You mean, like the Muunilist banks?"

"Yep," Cindee said. "The Banking Union backs pretty much all currency galaxy-wide. They have almost as much power as the Emperor. They certainly command more money. This bank has numbered accounts only. They give you a code chit and that's it. No names, nothing else. But they offer a nice rate of return since in the end the banks always win."

An hour later, Tobin and Klinti left the bank and parted company with Cindee as they meandered down the promenade. They kept a few credits out for themselves while sending an anonymous contribution to the Unitarian Sect—the rest they put into a joint account. They eventually found a restaurant to eat at and a room for the night, since Jine wasn't going to ship out until the next day.

That night, Tobin sat cross-legged on the room's sole bed, sinking into the Force as he meditated. Meditation had been difficult since his mother's death, but with time and activity he was able to distract himself.

Now, as he sank deep into meditation, he summoned images of her face. The feel of her lips brushing his cheek as a young boy. The warmth of her. The fragrance. Wrapped in the Force as he was, it all came back with brilliant and terrible clarity.

He felt a hand on his cheek, and realize the touch was not a vision, but Klinti. She pulled a finger away, and he saw his own tears on it. "The past will always be with you. You don't need to stare at it so long. Look to the future."

She sat beside him, and he once more sank into the Force. This time he allowed the currents of the Force to pull and push him forward. He saw once again the fleeting image of he and Klinti, living as man and wife in happy obscurity. He saw an image of himself standing atop a mountain of bodies with a circlet on his head and blood dripping from the signet ring his mother had given him.

He saw himself at the head of a massive army. Then he saw another path. A face, pretty but insolent. Angry eyes flashing at him. Angry eyes melting into something softer.

It was the girl from the fairytale dreams he had as a child. Of the vision Darth Sidious had shown him.

He pulled out of the meditation. Klinti sat perfectly still beside him, and he knew through her unique vision she had seen everything. "She's the path you're going to choose," she whispered.

Tobin swallowed hard. "It is the only one not filled with death."

Klinti bowed her head then leaned over until her face almost touched her knees. Since joining Jine she had forgone the veil and used the shades instead. Now she let them fall to the worn carpeting on the floor. Her chest shook as she cried dry tears.

Tobin rested his hand on her back and simply sat, projecting warmth and love at her through the Force. Finally, when the fit passed, she straightened and turned to him with her darkened, sightless eyes. "She may have you in the future," she said urgently, "but for now you are mine."

He leaned down and kissed her, and was surprised in turn by the savagery of her kiss. When they parted, he said, "No matter where my path takes me, I will always love you."

She stood and shrugged out of her space vest. "Show me," she said, still with hot, desperate intensity.

Unlike the Zabrak's ship, the _Fool's Prize_ did more than just attack other vessels. Hal-Aslo managed to build up a relationship with dock bosses on several worlds through a combination of charisma and bribes. "Got to spend the money to make the money," was the captain's tag line.

In fact, the smuggling was their primary income. Though Shreei complained about dry runs, she was referring only to the ship's pirating attempts. The smuggling and transport never actually went away, which is why the ship was able to maintain its supplies. It just was never enough to make anyone rich, and so Shreei complained about it.

For Tobin and Klinti, though, the smuggling was the truly enjoyable part. Not because they were breaking the law, but because they got to visit other worlds. For the most part, they kept within the old Corporate Sector because of its proximity to the Hydian Way, but even so there were thousands of worlds to see and visit.

Their cargo ranged from glitterstems to nerf embryos. They moved people and luggage. They were the ultimate low-fare transport, except of course they were outrageously expensive. This was because the customers were paying to avoid Imperial notice.

It was on one such run moving a group from Ulicia to the Rings that Tobin began to truly understand what Soola had gone through.

Like most worlds in the Corporate Sector, Ulicia had been terraformed a thousand years prior by the Ulicianus Primarius Corporation as an agrarian world dedicated to food production. Over the centuries the planet built up its own internal industrial section, but stayed true to its original charter by producing almost five percent of the entire sector's food stuffs.

It seemed an unlikely home for sedition. However, when the captain told his crew of their destination, he explained that the Empire had cracked down on the world hard.

"Two whole garrisons of troopers," Hal-Aslo explained. "They took out the capital city from orbit and declared martial-law planet-wide. They're keeping if off the holonet, but a lot of people died there."

"What species?" Cindee said. Mama Hackstrong was primarily in charge of stocking supplies and not all species could eat the same food.

"Human, mostly. Borali, to be precise. Religious fanatics." He grinned at Shindo. "No offense."

"None taken."

Corra snorted.

"So what are we moving?"

"Three families," Jine said. "They'll be staying in the cargo hold in tents. They know it and are okay with it. They have their own food, enough for the trip. And they're paying full price. Even after I give the dock boss his share, we'll be coming up ahead."

After the meeting, Tobin and Klinti sought out Shindo in his cabin. He was alone and reading from a palm-holo. He looked up and smiled. "I thought you might come."

Tobin smiled at the older man. Their weeks on the ship had given him a good measure of the man, and he liked what he saw. Shindo Bard did not complain either about his lot in life or his job. He did not speak bitterly about the loss of his wife or his home on Corella. He showed flashes of irritation with his daughter's suitors, and with his daughter, for that matter, but not beyond what any father would feel watching his daughter throw her affections away.

He was strong in a quiet, competent fashion that Tobin admired.

"So tell me about the Borali," he said.

"They're Unitarian," Shindo said.

"All of them?" Klinti asked.

"As far as I know," Shindo said. "They are a private group, but one or two have reached out to offer quiet support to some of our sects. The problem is, the Empire knows they're Unitarian. So they tend not to make waves. You don't see many Unitarians in the Imperial service, and even fewer in corporate positions of power. They stay quiet on their home world and a few agrarian colonies. Until now, I guess. Never thought I'd hear about a Baroli colony planning sedition."

"Interesting," Tobin said. "Well, thank you, Shindo."

"Tobin?"

Tobin paused. "Yes?"

"Can the Force tell you the future?"

Tobin and Klinti shared a long look before they turned back to the older man. "It can show paths," Tobin said.

"Am…am I on the right path? With my life, I mean."

It was Klinti who sat next to the older man. Wordlessly she took his hand and bowed his head. After a moment, she turned to Tobin with her sightless eyes. "Did you see?"

"An impression only, but yes."

By this time Shindo was wide-eyed. "What? Am I going to die?"

"Oh, certainly," Tobin said. "But not for many years to come. We both saw a path you could follow."

"And what path was that?"

"To answer, I have to ask you a question," Klinti said. "If Tobin were to leave right now and obtain his own ship, and if he were to offer you a berth, would you go with him?"

"Well, yes, I suppose I would," Shindo said. "You're Force-blessed."

"That's your answer, Shindo," Tobin said quietly. "For better or for ill, the moment you vouched for me with your captain, you linked your path to mine. There will come a time when I lead, and both Klinti and I saw that you would be following. More than following. You will be one of my trusted friends."

Shindo smiled. "Well, that doesn't sound so bad."

"Assuming the whole future doesn't reset itself tomorrow," Klinti said. "The future changes every second."

"Every second," Tobin agreed.


	13. What is Right

**Chapter Thirteen: What is Right**

Ulicia was bleeding.

When they arrived in system they were immediately hailed by an Imperial picket ship in orbit. Tobin was not in the cockpit to hear whatever Hal-Aslo said, but it must have been convincing.

What Tobin looked at was a scar that was visible even from orbit.

The strike at the planet's capital city must have been made with heavy turbolaser cannons. They could see a black spot that poured huge plumes of smoke into the atmosphere of what appeared to be an otherwise lush and verdant world. As they assumed orbit pending final landing instructions, Tobin could see a second similar scar on the second continent, even larger this time.

He opened himself up to the Force and felt pain. It echoed on the world below, as if the planet itself were throbbing in agony.

Their orbital insertion took them within easy sight of the second, larger scar. From within the atmosphere it looked as if the world had been turned into a hell. The soil was blackened and cracked, exposing the angry molten rock that had boiled up through the punctures caused by the turbolasers. The mantle-piercing power of heavy-turbolasers was well known when a barrage was fired in a single spot. Rather than fire all over the city, the Imperial ships must have a fired in a set pattern to crack the mantle enough to create this nightmare.

They set down in a debris-strewn spaceport two hundred clicks from the epicenter of the attack. The community they arrived at had been flattened outright by the shockwave of the bombardment. They could see the grid-pattern of streets, but any structure over two stories was simply gone. The dock itself was open air and had nothing more than a few empty pads and a well-armored refueling station.

It also housed a large Imperial Portable Command Module.

"Oh joy," Jine said when they sat down.

The moment their ramp opened, they were met by a squad of troopers and an officer in light grey. The whole crew was assembled in the common room when Jine led the officer and the troopers into the ship.

"This is the whole crew?" the officer said with a sneer.

"It is," Jine said. "Nah, hold that. Our programmer is in the med-bay."

"What is wrong with him?"

"She scratched both corneas," Jine lied smoothly. Klinti was indeed in their small med-bay with bandages around her 'eyes' for this very reason.

"Won't do you much good there," the officer noted.

"I take care of my own," Jine said with a shrug. "You said you wanted to search the ship?"

"Do you wish to declare anything before we do?"

"No, I dropped my last cargo off at Suun Lin. It was a short hop here."

"And why are you here?"

"Ulician mash," Jine said. "New distributor wanted to try and crack the market off planet but didn't have enough to warrant a larger ship, and didn't want to get entangled in a long-term shipping contract."

"I see," the officer said. "Anything else you wish to declare?"

In plain sight of both the troopers and the crew, Jine handed over an unmarked credit chip. "Nothing else. This should be enough to cover docking fees and licenses."

The officer saw the amount on the chit and nodded. "Indeed. Well, it's obvious you have nothing else of importance here. Your landing rights extend twenty-six hours. Make sure you are gone by this time tomorrow."

"Yes, sir. Thank you."

"Thank the stars for corrupt officials," Cindee Hackstrong said when the Imperial was gone. "Was that the dock boss?"

Jine shook his head while Shreei growled. "Nope. Guess the old one got replaced. Tobin, you will come with Shreei and me. I want the rest to stay here on the ship. Doesn't look like there's much to see around here anymore anyway."

Tobin followed the captain and his first mate down the ramp and was immediately assaulted by the hot, sulphuric air. As he did so, he became aware of a fine ash that was falling like snow over the whole world.

"Like paradise," Jine said darkly. "I was here just eight months ago. Place was pretty and clean and as good as you could ask. Now look at this."

They unloaded their small air van and were soon flying slowly among the shattered homes. Only as they did so could they see survivors. Men, women and children cloaked in ash used shirts or paper held up as masks against the detritus falling from the sky while searching hopelessly through the rubble that used to be their homes.

The devastation was stunning. The lack of assistance from the Empire even more so.

"Why aren't these people getting help?" Tobin finally asked.

"They are being punished," Shreei snarled. Already, Tobin was picking up a smattering of Selonian and was able to understand her.

He could only agree. He remembered a story on the holonets of a natural disaster on some world in the Mid Rim. The Empire dispatched a whole fleet of ships to provide medical aid and rebuilding assistance to the survivors.

Here, there was a picket ship in orbit and a command module overseeing incoming traffic, as if the Empire wanted to actually prevent the world from receiving any help.

Their trip took them outside of the shattered community into a fold of rolling hills. The occasional structures in the hills fared better, but only marginally so. Still, the directions Jine followed brought them to a warehouse on the side of a hill facing away from the devastation that apparently survived with only mild structural damage.

"This is it," Jine said. He looked back at his two companions. "Not sure what kind of mood these folks are going to be in. I got the note before the worst of this went down. Last I heard, the capital on the other continent was the only target."

"We'll never know just talking," Shreei said guttural Basic.

With a nod and a deep breath of the still-acrid air, Jine stepped forward to the small door that stood in the middle of the metal wall, and rapped loudly three times with his knuckles.

They waited for nearly a minute before the door opened and a man stepped out. He appeared to be a stereotypical Baroli, with short-cropped blue-gray hair and traditional tattoos on his face that appeared to be sagging with age and stress.

"You're Hal-Aslo?" he said without preamble.

"I am."

"Those your crew?"

"They are."

"Come in! Quickly."

The man stepped aside and the three smugglers stepped into the warehouse.

The first thing Tobin noticed was the smell. The smell of cooked meat was almost overpowering. Then came the sounds—muted moans of pain and the whispers of many strained voices.

Tobin stepped past the startled man, through the tiny office stacked with Ulician mash, and into the main floor of the warehouse.

The floor was filled with perhaps thirty cots filled with burned survivors of the attack. There were others also hurt, perhaps another twenty, but they wore splints or bandages indicating they suffered secondary injuries. There were at least fifty injured, and another thirty or so busily tending to their needs with what looked like the barest of supplies. Those that helped had expressions of hopelessness on their faces.

The pain in the room made Tobin's head spin. Behind him, he was only distantly aware of Jine and the man talking. "…as many as I could, but there were so many. Those of us in the surrounding area tried to spread the wounded out. But these were the worst of the survivors."

"Are you all coming?"

"Force help me, but yes. I can't stand the thought of my family living on this world any more. We've already detected a drop in the global temperature. We'll be lucky if even a third of our arable land survives the attack. I'm fortunate—I can afford to pay."

"For all these folks?"

Tobin turned to see the man gulp. "Yes," he finally said. "These people are my responsibility now. I'll take care of them until I don't have a chit left to my name. We've already set up some cargo trailers to hold us all. If the Imperials open one up they'll see a wall of mash. When we get to the Rings, you can have the Mash."

Tobin looked up in surprise. "You're going to the Rings? Why there?"

The man's eyes were red with grief and exhaustion. He smelled as if he hadn't bathed in days and looked as if he were about to collapse. "This is my fault," he said at last. "I pushed through the legislation in the Ruling Council confirming Unitarianism as the official belief system of the planet. Me and a few other businessmen. We couldn't imagine the Empire would do this. The governor warned us there would be consequences, but this is our world, and we were willing to face arrest and trial. But what they did…" His voice cracked. "Have you ever seen twenty million people die in the space of five heartbeats?"

"No," Tobin whispered.

He turned to Jine, who said, "We were promised nearly ten thousand a person. You telling me you can afford eight hundred thousand chits?"

The man started to stutter.

"Captain," Tobin said. "Eight or eighty, if there's room, does it really matter?"

"Shane, I know this is hard, but we're a business. We can't…"

"Take my share for the difference," Tobin said. "Klinti's too. If you need more, we'll pay you from the last split. We can't leave any of these people behind."

The Baroli man was staring at Tobin. Across the floor, he felt other eyes on him as well, but his only focus was on Jine. Shreei muttered in Selonian, but after a moment Jine nodded. "No," he finally said, "you're right. There's room. I'll need to add another ten from the original price to cover water and essentials. Can you afford ninety?"

The businessman nodded with obvious relief. "I'll pay a hundred thousand," he said. "Thank you!"

"Yes," Tobin said. "Thank you, Captain. And I meant what I said—you can have my share, and Klinti's as well, to cover any additional expense."

Jine looked over the people as they began to get ready for the move. "You can't save everyone, Tobin."

"No. But we can save them. That'll have to be enough for now."

Jine nodded and went to call the ship to get ready. The man turned to Tobin. "My name is Afton Shrief. You are Shane?"

With a quiet look over Shrief's shoulder at Jine and Shreei, Tobin briefly pulled out his necklace. "I am a friend," he said softly.

Shrief's eyes widened, then a strange thing happened. He started to sob. Quietly, but nonetheless he began to sob. A moment later a young woman, his daughter, moved to his side. "Father? Are you…"

Shrief, though, reached forward until a hand came around Tobin's shoulders. The young warrior was surprised to be pulled into a desperate embrace. "Thank you, brother," the older man said. "Thank you!"

The woman's eyes widened. "Be strong," Tobin said finally. "The Force will guide us. The path is not always easy, but guidance is there if we can just follow."

"The sect in the Rings?" the girl asked. "It's true?"

"Is strong," Tobin assured her. "They will help you. We will help you. Now—what can I do?"

It took two hours to load the wounded into the specially prepared trailers. The trailers were lined with caskets of mash, and then held in place with a thermal reflecting shield wall that would give the illusion of more rows to a casual resonance scanner. Behind the wall was sufficient space for twenty people to hide with a small air circulator. Tobin knew the business man had paid for the trailers as well.

Tobin activated the repulsor coils on the trailers when everyone was loaded and pulled them out to the sleds. Each trailer slid effortlessly into its sled, and when they were fitted snugly, the binders formed a hover train out of the sleds.

He walked back to the van where Jine and Shreei waited. "You're a fanatic like Shindo, aren't you?" Jine asked.

"Not like Shindo, no," Tobin said. "For them the Force is a belief system. They've never seen it or how it affects them, so they have to believe. Me—my mother was a Jedi knight. I don't have to believe to know it's real." He looked back at the sleds. "This, though, this isn't just a matter of faith. These were good people. They did not deserve this punishment." He locked the captain in a strong gaze. "And you are doing a good thing by helping them."

Jine said nothing more, and after connecting the van, they began the long, slow trip back to the edges of the shattered city. They found the ship where they left it, and as they approached the same officer as before approached with two troopers and a technician.

"Hope those trailers were done up right," Jine said under his breath.

"Halt for inspection," the officer called.

They slowed their caravan down and watched as the troopers performed a quick sweep of the trailers. Evidently, whatever precautions the Baroli people too paid off. The troopers nodded to the officer, who waived them on toward the _Fool's Prize_.

The load ramp dropped down between the front loading arms as soon as they came in range. Shindo, Haslo, Dek and Hanson walked down the ramp and helped Tobin connect the loader hook. One by one, they slid the trailers into the cargo hold of the freighter. The space was tight, but not impossibly so.

"So, what's our cut on this?" Dek finally asked the captain.

"Three a piece, save for Tobin and Klinti," Captain said. "Gave their share over to help pay passage for a few more folks."

Shindo stared at Tobin for a moment. "That isn't right, Captain."

"It's all right," Tobin said quickly before any tempers flared. "I'm glad to do it. Klinti too. We're still cruising from the last hit. We'll be fine."

With that, they stowed away the van and awaited permission from the command module to lift off. That came an hour after loading, and soon after that the _Fool's Prize _was blasting away from the planet.

Tobin found Klinti in their cabin shortly after take-off. He told her quickly what happened, and that he bargained his and her shares. She merely nodded. "It was the right thing to do," she said. "Will you attempt to help them in transit?"

"The Jedi in me says I must. The Sith in my says to do so would expose myself foolishly."

"To people who already believe in you," she pointed out. She snuggled up next to him. "There is so much blood in your path, Tobin. When the Force brings you a chance to give healing, do you really want to ignore it? There must be a balance in all things."

He looked down at her, taken as always with her beauty. "You're smart."

"Yes, I am."

During the ship's night cycle, Tobin and Klinti left their cabin and walked toward the cargo hold. It just so happened that Shindo was on duty that night and sat at a station next to the cargo hold main entrance. He smiled up at them. "Somehow, I thought you might be by tonight."

"Any word from them?" Klinti asked.

"None," Shindo said. "I stuck my head in earlier to make sure they were doing okay. They have injured."

"I know," Tobin said softly. "That's why I'm here."

"You can…?" The older man stopped himself, and then nodded. "I'll knock three times if the captain comes."

"Thank you," Tobin said.

The two stepped into the crowded hold. The trailers had been opened and casks of the mash removed to allow more air to flow into the confined spaces. The wounded remained in the trailers, though the healthy moved about. For the first time Tobin saw children, perhaps ten of them in ages from toddler to teens.

Afton Shrief made his way through the quarters until he met them. "Hello," he said. He took Tobin's hand and pumped it. "I'm so glad you came. Is this your wife?"

"Klinti," she said in answer.

"It is so dark, dear," the man said. He sounded like a father. "How can you see with those glasses?"

She smiled. "It's amazing what I can see," she said.

"Are all your people of the faith?" Tobin asked.

Shrief nodded. "We all attended temple together. We all signed the declaration for it to be our open faith."

Tobin looked around at the people. He saw eyes on him—some curious, some hopeful. "If you see things that cannot be explained, will they remain in this room or among the faithful only?"

"I don't…"

Klinti removed her glasses and looked at the blanching man without eyes. Tobin held her hand. "Take me to your worst wounded."

"You are…." Shrief couldn't finish. Instead, he walked them through the silent crowd to the far trailer. A cot had been moved to the mouth of the trailer. This burn victim was a child of perhaps eight. One arm was blackened, as was one side of her face, while her hair was simply gone. Her eyes were closed and her breath came in ragged gasps. The burns were weeping through the burn cloth covering them. "We have no bacta," Shrief said simply. His voice caught. "My youngest. My wife shielded Lai with her body. She did not survive, and I thought I would lose Lai on this voyage as well."

Tobin fought to keep his eyes clear of tears. He stepped around the girl and knelt down on her healthy side. He was aware of others slowly gathering around. He looked up at the people around him. "I am Force-blessed," he said honestly. "I can heal her, but to do so would require more Force energy than I can create. There is a way, but it calls for sacrifice."

Shrief fell to his knees on the other side of his daughter. "I would give my life for her," the man said. "I would do anything. If you can help her, I beg of you to do so."

"There is a Sith technique that would allow me to use all of your life energy," Tobin said. "It would not in any way shorten your lives, but it will leave you tired. The more who volunteer, the less impact it would have. I can then use that energy to heal her."

"You speak truly?" Shrief said. Behind him, other Baroli were whispering.

"I will show you," Tobin said.

"Then I volunteer myself," Shrief said without hesitation. "Take all my life, if you must."

"I volunteer," Shrief's older daughter said. That set off a flood, until every able-bodied adult volunteered.

Tobin nodded somberly. "This will hurt," he told them. "I cannot help that. The Sith created this technique to steal the life of their enemy."

"How do you know it?" Shrief's daughter asked.

"I was taught it by the last Dark Lord of the Sith," Tobin told her honestly. "Just as I was taught by the last Jedi how to turn the power to one of healing. Are you ready?"

The Baroli were wide-eyed, but willing. He lifted his left hand to them, while placing the other on the stomach of the burned girl. Suddenly flicks of red lightning reached out to the crowd, seemingly licking each person there. At the same time, Tobin's right hand took on a bluish light as he pushed the stolen Force energy into the burned girl.

It was the most difficult use of the Force Tobin had ever attempted. The filthy stolen life energy made him shake while he strove to transform it into the clean energy of healing power. Still, he did not stop until he could feel the skin cells regenerating; the alveoli regenerating from the heat-seared tissue that caused the girl pain with each breath.

After an eternity that lasted nearly an hour, Tobin finally stopped. His hands were shaking violently, and in front of him the exhausted volunteers fell to their knees gasping. With a shaking hand, Tobin reached over the girl's body and placed a hand on the charred surface of her arm.

Shrief and his older daughter sucked in air in alarm when Tobin gripped the arm and wiped it.

The charred, dead tissue fell away to reveal healthy skin below it. Klinti disappeared for a moment and arrived back with a wet cloth. She knelt down beside Tobin and began wiping away the dead tissue to show the beautiful, blue-haired girl beneath the burns.

Shrief was crying openly, as was his daughter. Behind him, the rest of the adults made the broken circle on their chests while staring at Tobin in reverence.

"We all need to rest," Tobin said. "We are four days out from the Rings. I'll return tomorrow, and we will heal another in need."

"Thank you, Force-blessed," Shrief said. "Thank you for my daughter!"

With an exhausted nod, Tobin tried to stand, but could not. It was Klinti who helped him back to their cabin. Where they passed, the people pressed a hand against him reverently, as if wanting to give a little more of their life energy to revive him.

"It was the right thing to do," Klinti said as the two settled into their bunk. "I am so proud of you."

Tobin smiled at her, but said nothing. Instead, he thought of the adoration on their faces. It chilled him to know that at that point they would have walked into the vacuum of space itself for him.


	14. Promises

**Chapter Fourteen: Promises**

They reached the Rings safely. In the course of their passage Tobin was able to heal seven more people. The little girl, Lai, was the most injured of them all. The rest required less effort, and often Tobin was able to heal two or more. When they arrived, Shindo led the refugees directly to Kenth Hamner, who took them all in with open arms.

The mash was actually given to Tobin. He sold the caskets to a Ring retailer and ended up making more for himself and Klinti than the captain did. Fortunately, Jine was a good sport about it. "Keep it," the captain said. "Sometimes it feels good to do the right thing."

Over the next six months, Jin Hal-Aslo and the _Fool's Prize_ struck three more targets in between smuggling runs.

One provided medical supplies with a high resale price. The other actually carried food stuffs. While it provided almost no resale value, Cindee made a veritable feast for the crew from it.

The third target, however, broke the string of good luck.

Tobin knew it was a mistake the first time Jine laid out the plan. The target was a corporate transport that, according to the most recently purchased list, carried the payroll for a mining colony world in unmarked Imperial credit chips. Almost twenty million in credit chips.

"It's a trap," Tobin said the moment Jine finished outlining his plan and stared triumphantly at the rest of the crew.

The captain's smile collapsed instantly. "This list came from our best contact. A controller in the Corporate Sector Authority. Dek got it personally. It can't be a trap."

Shreei murmured something in Selonian. The female Devaronian Silmari snorted. "Shreei, you wouldn't know a trap if it cut your paw off. Shane's right. That is too much money for a single registered transport to carry without escort. If the escort isn't with it, it will be close enough to intercept us the moment we jump. Chances are it's not carrying anything and the Imperials are trying to lure us to our deaths."

"We have our torps now," Jine said, his voice rising. "We can blast anything short of a frigate out of the sky. For twenty million it would be worth every shot! That would be almost a million credits for each of you! We could build a whole stars-be-damned fleet with that much money."

"Or we could be vaped to atoms," Silmari said.

Tobin cleared his throat. "Captain, I'll do what you ordered because that's the promise I made you. But when I tell you it's a trap, I'm not just speaking to you as a crewman. I'm speaking to you as the son of a Jedi. It _feels_ like a trap."

The rest of the crew fell completely still as Jine stared at Tobin for the longest time. When he spoke, his voice dropped an octave. "I know this is a huge risk," he admitted. "But this is also a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity. This could change all our lives. A million credits could buy all of you a life of luxury. And I tell you now that's how much I'll give to each of you—a full million." He bowed his head, then glanced at Shreei. "We'll take a vote. For my part, I say we take the risk."

Shreei growled an affirmative. Shon the Veltron nodded for the strike, as did Dek and Hanson. Cindee shrugged. "No risk, no gain. I say we go."

Corra and Haslo Bard voted to go, but Shindo shook his head. "Shane and Simlari say it's a trap, and I believe them." Silmari shook her head as well. Vilmarn started to nod until his mate slapped him in the back of his head. The nod immediately turned to a shake of his head.

Klinti shook her head, but the prevailing mood was clear. "Eight to five we attack," Jine said. "The ship has voted. Will everyone abide by the majority vote?"

"You know we will," Silmari said. "If it's our day to die, we die. If not, we be rich. But when we die, I'm going to kick your human tail."

Jine laughed giddily. "And I'll bend over to let you. All right, people, let's get ready. And let's proceed as if this is a trap. What can we do to get ready for it?"

/\/\/\/\

The night before the attack on the transport, Tobin and Klinti left the ship and took a tram to the Node. They carried their swimwear in their satchels.

Neither spoke very much—they knew that they were walking into a trap by attacking that ship. Klinti could see nothing beyond it, and Tobin could only feel a sense of foreboding. Between the two of them was the constant nagging question of whether they should walk away or not.

"If we abandon the ship, we'll be anathema," Klinti answered the unspoken question. They had placed a blanket on the black sand and simply lay by the water, listening to the waves lapping on the shore. "No one would hire us, and even together we wouldn't be able to afford much more than a shuttle."

"I could force him," Tobin said. "I could influence his thoughts to do as we require."

"But you won't, will you?"

Tobin looked over and saw her lips set firmly. "No," he said. "I won't. I know how you feel about that."

She nodded. "Swim with me?"

"Always."

They spent the afternoon playing in the water. Often they would go just deep enough for Tobin to stand with water to his shoulders, and Klinti would float. Tobin placed his hands under her to hold her, and she would simply stay that way. For a while, her face would take on a peaceful expression.

Then a thought made her brows furrow and her nostrils flair. "I don't trust Dek."

"Why?"

"When he looks at me, he's afraid."

Fear led to hatred. Hatred led to darkness. "He's the one who procured the list."

"I know."

She knowingly sank as she sat up. His arms conformed to her and she put her arm around his neck until she rested her head on his shoulder. "I'm so scared," she admitted.

"I'll protect you," Tobin promised. "On my life, I'll protect you."

"What if it's not enough?"

"Then we'll be together in the Force," Tobin said. "And I'll love you even then."

He started toward the beach. "Come on, there's something I want to do before we go."

"What?"

"I'll show you later. Another promise."

They showered the salt off their bodies, dressed and went into the main concourses of the first Ring. Their shopping trip took them through several levels until Tobin found the store he was looking for.

"Tobin?" Klinti asked with uncertainty.

"I can't marry you," Tobin said. "We know why. But if we could, I'd have asked you the moment I saw you again. But if I can't marry you legally, I can at least give you the promise of my love." He purchased the ring with money from the sale of the mash, and slipped it onto her right ring finger. It took a great deal of concentration to make the gold band adjust to her slender finger.

"A firegem?" she whispered. She did not need to hold the ring to her face. She could see it no matter where she held her hand.

"A promise ring. It's like I told you, no matter what happens, I will always belong to you."

He could sense a well of emotion from her, and knew that if she had eyes she would be crying. Instead, she pulled her arms around his neck and kissed him with fiery passion. "Let's go back to our room," she said.

He smiled at her and nodded. "Good idea."

/\/\/\/\

The crew of the _Fool's Prize_ was nervous when it left the Rings that morning. Everyone keyed off Tobin's pessimism, though he made sure to keep his mouth shut. However, Shindo knew just who and what Tobin was, and knew just from the look on the young man's face that the mission was a mistake.

Still, everyone did their duty. All the weapons were armed. All five of the proton torpedoes were loaded into the launch tube feeder. The quad cannons were primed, and the raiding party was ready.

Tobin sat in the cockpit with Jine and Shree when they arrived at their ambush site a day early. "These are the coordinates," the young captain said. "Let's get the probes launched."

Tobin nodded and left the bridge. He found Cindee lounging in the fore section of the ship chewing a rystick. The sweetened treat left a smell of sugar on the air. "We ready?"

"We're ready," Tobin confirmed. The two took the torpedo-sized probe and fitted it manually into the launcher. As soon as they launched it, they fitted three more.

"Well, that's the whole collection," Cindee said. "Never used 'em all before."

"Jine is betting this is an all or none mission," Tobin said.

Cindee looked him in the face. "You really think it's going to go down bad, don't you?"

Tobin wanted to shout at her that of course it was going to go bad. But there was no point. "The captain let me say my piece, and the crew voted. Doesn't really matter what I think now."

"Well, that's fair enough," Cindee said. "I admit I have a bad feeling myself, but my Daddy always told me you'd never get anywhere without risk. And this is a LOT of money to take a risk for."

"I know," Tobin assured her. "Will you retire with it?"

"Absolutely," she said. "I know this is a dangerous business. The smart ones know when to get out."

"Well, hopefully everything will go perfect and you'll get your chance. What next?"

"Next are the mines."

The seismic mines were almost as large as the torpedoes. Fortunately, the little loader cart worked on them as well. They fired out four of them, each with enough destructive capacity to rock even a frigate. The mines had proximity fuses and further had mini-thrusters to ensure they reached that proximity. The four together should easily disable anything smaller and less shielded. The mines were almost twenty thousand credits a piece.

Jine really was pouring everything he had into this operation.

When they done, they once again attached the automated torpedo loader to the launcher door.

"Well, that's it for us," Cindee said. "Might as well get into your suit."

"Right," Tobin said.

When he came back out into the main common room of the ship, he noticed that almost everyone else was already in their pressure suits. "Better get dressed, Tobin," Dek said unnecessarily.

Tobin saw Klinti at the ship's computer console, monitoring local holonet traffic. She did not move her head up to him, but he knew she saw him clearly. Through the Force the two exchanged a glance and even a little rush of affection before he went to get dressed.

By the time he returned in the old pressure suit Jine had purchased for his crew, everyone else was at their positions. He too took his seat before the laser cannons and then waited.

"So what are you going to do with your share of the money, Corra?" Dek asked suddenly.

"Buy a house on Nabu," she said. "Heard tell it's beautiful there. What about you?"

"I'm going to get my own ship," Dek said firmly. "You could come with me."

"Yeah, I suppose I could," Corra said with a flirty laugh.

Tobin closed his eyes. The Force was roaring a warning to him, but there was nothing to do.

/\/\/\/\

The transport arrived within a few minutes of when it was supposed to. The first mine went off with a spectacular explosion that set of a disk-shaped shockwave of discharged plasma. Seconds later, the second, third and finally fourth mine all went off as well. The shockwaves struck the automated transport like storm waves striking a water-borne ship. It rocked violently until the final wave actually blew out its navigational jets and sent it spinning.

At the same time, Cindee let loose with the ion cannon, splashing the ship with the brilliant blue beams until Klinti called out, "It's dead."

Dek let out a whoop. "That was easy!"

_Too easy,_ Tobin thought.

"Tobin," Jine called, "time to open the door for us."

"Yes, captain," Tobin said. He targeted his laser cannon and fired off a clustered round of shots that punched a hole through the armored hull, which without any shielding could not resist the power of the shots.

"Okay, helmets on," Jine called. "Shindo, you're lead. Let's go get our money. Remember, in the event this is a trap grab credits only, nothing else."

Tobin by that time already had his helmet on. He, Shindo and his kids, Dek, Hanson, Shon, both Devaronians and Jine himself all gathered in the rear cargo bay. The air around them hissed as the air evacuated the chamber. As soon as the hissing stopped, the ramp lowered exposing them to the brilliant starfield. They were hundreds of light years away from the nearest system, and so without any sunlight they got a breath-taking view of the galaxy around them.

The view core-ward was breathtaking. A silvery disc took up much of the sky to Tobin's left as he and the others stepped from the ramp into the utter voice. Shindo at the lead had the navi jets on his suit and guided them unerringly toward the hulled transport ship.

The passage over was done in complete silence. Despite eons in space, it was still an alien environment the human mind had difficulty adjusting to without its small bubbles of air. It was actually Tobin's first time in open space, and rather than fear he felt a sense of complete exhilaration. He could _feel_ the whole galaxy. It felt as if all the life in all the worlds was singing a song for his ears alone.

"Beautiful," he whispered.

"No daydreaming," Dek said. "Gotta keep sharp now."

Tobin crushed down his irritation at the little man. Dek was acting much more nervous than normal, and that was not a good sign.

"Easy there," Shindo said, more to himself than anyone else. "We're almost there. Make sure you don't knot your tethers."

They arrived at the transport. Behind them, Shreei was using the orbital jets to bring the _Fool's Prize_ up as close to the transport as possible.

Finally Shindo made contact with the hull. Seconds later the rest alit as well. They pulled their blasters since they knew full well vacuum would not slow down droids. "Ready?" Shindo asked. "On three. One, two, three!"

He pulled himself in, as did the rest. The hall was darkened, possibly as a defensive measure. Not only was the ship dark, its artificial gravity plating was off. That meant all power was gone.

"Those mines must have done a number on this ship," Dek noted.

They made their way weightlessly through the empty corridor, guided only by the illuminators in their helmets. Tobin paused after a few meters, which caused Shindo to jerk back on the tether and the others to collide with him.

"Tobin, what are you doing?" Dek demanded.

Tobin pointed at the wall. There was a large whole there. It was not caused by blaster damage or an explosion. He could see bolt holes around the edge of a rectangular gap in the wall. Under his light, they could even make out the glint of an old wire.

"The ship has been stripped," Tobin said with absolute certainty. "There's nothing here."

At the end of the tether, Jine said, "Could be trying to fool us into leaving before we find it."

"There's nothing here," Tobin said. "This is a trap. It was always a trap." He turned and stared long and hard at Dek. Even through the visor, he could see the other man flushing furiously.

"Don't you go blaming this on me!" Dek snapped back.

"We need to get back to the _Prize_," Tobin said.

"We really need to look more," Jine said. "We just can't give up without trying a little. I mean, hells, Shane, twenty million! Shane?"

Tobin's face had fallen. "They're here," he said. "They've come for us."

"Captain!" came Shreei's voice over their helmet coms. "Imperial frigate just came out of hyperspace! They're closing fast."

"Awww krif it all to the seven hells!" Jine shouted. "Come on, let's get moving! Now!"

As the rear of the tether, Jine became the new leader. Like Shindo, his suit also had a small jet pack. He activated it now, pulling them haphazardly through the corridor. They all came together like a Bith squeezebox when they reached the hole.

No one complained as Jine reoriented and then shot them out of the airlock. Just as they left the ship, a thick beam of green light ripped through space not more than forty meters away. The radiation of its passage caused the outer skin of Tobin's suit to boil, and immediately a host of warning signs came on. The frigate was already firing on them.

"Yeah, I'm getting them too," Jine said of the warnings.

They reached the transport airlock and immediately disconnected their tethers. The air came rushing in as soon as the ramp was closed. Almost immediately something struck the ship with sufficient force to knock them all from their feet.

Jine didn't even bother removing his suit. He threw his helmet down and ran toward the cockpit.

The rest ran out to their individual stations. Tobin saw Klinti had fallen with the impact of the first shot, but had regained her seat. "That took out half our shield strength," she called out to anyone who would care.

Tobin settled into his gunner's seat and spotted the frigate. The ship had a smooth hull. Like all Imperial capital ships since the formation of the first Empire, the ship was triangular in shape, with four turbolaser batteries running up both its dorsal and ventral length. Smaller laser and ion cannons spotted its sides.

It was actually only six times the size of the _Fool's Prize_, but Tobin knew it had sufficient armament and shields to rule out any type of engagement.

On the way to the cockpit, Jine shouted, "Shreei, get us out of here!"

The Selonian's snarl was comment enough as the _Fool's Prize_ turned on its axis. Jine jumped into the pilot's seat. "Tractor beam," he muttered.

In the gunner's seat, Tobin felt the sudden jerk as well. "Shindo, Cindee," he said, "fire on the transport's engines!"

He didn't know if Jine agreed or approved and didn't care. They're only hope was breaking away. His and Shindo's laser cannons opened up on the transport ship, with Cindee's ion cannon adding what power it could.

Without shields, the transport did not last long and went up in a spectacular explosion as its reactor breached. The plasma shockwave of the explosion between the frigate and _Fool's Prize_ was just sufficient to break the lock. Suddenly the freighter was flying free.

"We're still under an interdiction field," Tobin heard the captain call back. "Arm the torps!"

In a move worthy of all his Corellan forebears, Jine spun the ship around and unloaded the full volley of torpedos. The first two impacted harmlessly against the frigate's shields, but the last three punched through and exploded against the armored hull.

At least one of the torpedoes was able to punch through into the innards of the ship. Tobin followed it with a barrage of laser cannon fire.

They soared right past the limping frigate. "I think we made it!" Dek cried.

"Dek, shut up!" Cindee said.

"They're coming around," Klinti said. "The interdiction field is still up. They're accelerating at point five."

Tobin knew from reading the frighter's specs that it could only accelerate to point three.

"Mines?" came Jine's response.

"Used them all," Cindee said.

"Any ideas?" the captain called back through the intercom.

"Say we're sorry?" Corra said.

"Don't think that's going to work, Corra," her brother said.

"The frigate has completed its turn and is now gaining," Klinti said. "It's in firing range."

The vacuum of space did not allow for the transmission of sound. But every time the lights dimmed and buzzed, they knew a turbolaser blast was perilously close. Suddenly one shot hit and once again the whole ship spun with the impact.

This time they were all braced. Klinti took a deep breath. "That's it for aft shielding."

"We're turning," Jine said. "Get ready to hit it with everything we have!"

A power turn in space for a freighter was a tricky affair, involving not just the vectored thrusters but also the orbital thrusters to kick the nose of the ship up. It was a terrible strain on the inertial dampening fields as well. Still, Jine was nothing if not an accomplished pilot. The _Fool's Prize_ made a graceful arc as it turned and started screaming at full speed toward the oncoming frigate.

The frigate started pouring green turbolaser fire at them, even as it trailed smoke from the damage the _Fool's Prize _had inflicted. Tobin aimed his cannons at the breached hull, knowing it was their best bet to cause any damage.

He saw the torpedoes launch from the ship's sharp tip and knew they were not going to make it. "Hang on!" Jine screamed. "Shreei, barrel…."

The first torpedo struck the cockpit. The whole ship shuddered violently as the protrusion vaporized. The atmosphere within the ship rushed toward the hole before emergency bulkheads dropped into place. Without its pilot, the _Fool's Prize_ suddenly began somersaulting through space with its thrusters still on full.

The next torpedo struck the aft engine assembly and removed the thrusters completely. Through his com Tobin heard a brief scream as Shon Blue died. Suddenly the whole ship took on a blue glow as they were plastered with ion cannon blasts.

Tobin lost all concentration when he heard Klinti scream in agony as the ship's electrical systems fried. Tobin left his now useless gun port and ran across the darkened ship, guided by Force alone. The ion barrage continued, eventually overloading even the artificial gravity coils. By the time he reached Klinti, she was floating unconscious in the air.

He pulled her to him and felt for lifesigns. She was alive, but he could fee agony pouring from her even while unconscious. Her hands were burned, severely.

He pulled her into his arms even as the artificial gravity kicked back in. He caught her before she could fall and let her down gently into his lap.

"Tobin?" she said through gritted teeth. "It hurts!"

"I know, love," he said. He poured Force healing into her. His concentration broke when he heard a hiss, followed by sparks coming from the airlock door.

"Don't let go of me," Klinti whispered. "Please."

"I won't," Tobin promised.

The airlock door exploded inward. A moment later Imperial troopers flooded the room.

"Don't let go of me," Klinti pleaded again, though her voice faded to a whisper as she finally passed out from the pain.


	15. Broken

**Chapter Fifteen: Broken**

Imperial troopers rushed aboard with their bracer blasters at the ready. They found a crew stunned and injured, and no resistance. "Drop all weapons!" the leader trooper demanded.

Tobin made a show of slowly pulling his blaster butt-first and dropping it. He looked around the commons to see who was left. Haslo and his sister Corra entered the room with their father stumbling between them. Shindo's bald head glistened from a nasty looking cut. In a far corner, Silmari knelt by her injured mate, who did not move.

Dek Hastlin stumbled in with both hands in the air.

"Who else is on board?" the leader trooper demanded.

"The rest are dead," Tobin said bitterly.

"You're lucky not to all be dead," the lead trooper snarled. "The Empire does not take kindly to pirates. All of you on your feet, now. Carry your own injured, or they get spaced."

Silmari proved once again that the females were the stronger of the Devaronian genders by easily lifting Vilmarn in her arms. Tobin carried Klinti who curled up in his arms with a barely audible groan, while the Bard siblings continued to help their father.

Defeated, they followed the troopers out of the dying ship.

The frigate's halls had a faint sheen of smoke from Jine's frantic torpedo barrage, but otherwise were pristine. The halls were a light gray color with colored lines running through the halls to denote different ship sections. They followed the first trooper with the other twenty falling in behind them.

Almost immediately upon boarding the frigate they were met by an Imperial magistrate in purple robes flanked by more troopers. The man appeared to be in his sixties with slicked back gray hair and two chins.

"Crew of the pirate ship _Fool's Prize_, you are hereby found guilty of acts of piracy against the Empire. As it does not appear that your captain is with us, there is no point in discussing the death penalty. By the will of his majesty Emperor Antius Huun Fel III and the laws of the people and senate of the Galactic Empire, you are all hereby sentenced to a term of no less than 30 years in the Asteris II penal colony. There is no appeal to this sentence. Sentence is to begin immediately."

Three medics in light tray tunics stepped forward with gurneys.

"Place the wounded on these gurneys for treatment," the magistrate said. "The rest of you are to proceed to prisoner processing. Any resistance will be met with lethal force." The magistrate read the whole proclamation in a bored tone of voice, and when he was done he simply turned and walked away.

"Put her on the gurney," the trooper ordered Tobin.

Tobin looked at the trooper, then down at Klinti. She wore her shades still, but he could see from her hands and burns up her arms and even her chest that she needed a bacta treatment to survive, or a very visible Force treatment. He could not feel her mental sight on him and knew that her whole mind was absorbed in the agony of her burns. It took near physical effort to shield himself off from her agony.

He gently placed her on the gurney. Silmari did the same with Vilmarn while the two Bard siblings helped their groggy father onto the gurney.

The medics turned and carried the hover gurneys back to their medical bay. The troopers led the rest of the crew in the opposite direction for processing.

Tobin went because he could not think of anything else to do. He could kill their escorts, but the act of doing so would endanger the others. And with the _Fool's Prize_ destroyed he would have to somehow take control of an Imperial frigate by himself. He didn't know what the crew compliment of a frigate was, but he was relatively sure he wouldn't be able to do it.

He was paralyzed by fear for Klinti and for himself. It seemed as if his destiny was slowly slipping out of his fingers.

"Get moving!" the lead trooper snarled.

Tobin and the rest started walking through the corridors. Tobin saw blast doors and automated defenses. The ship was well-prepared for any boarding action it might face. Though it was small, it was a powerful weapon of destruction nonetheless.

Perhaps he and Klinti could get out of the penal colony, he thought, planning ahead. It was highly unlikely that any mere penal colony could hold him for long. As long as he had Klinti by his side he could do anything.

He reached out for her then but slowed his steps. From a distance he felt a hand pushing him in the back but he barely felt it.

_Tobin,_ came a weak touch through the Force. _You let go of me._

"Oh no," Tobin whispered aloud. That's when it struck. Through the Force he felt a terrible, rending pain that dropped him to his knees. Blackness slammed into his consciousness with horrid power. Searing heat burned through his veins. It felt as if a hand had reached into his chest and ripped his heart out.

Immediately suspecting a trick, the troopers jumped back and held their blasters ready. It was no trick, though. Tobin fell forward onto the floor as the black pain ripped into him, fully as horrible as the emptiness he felt when his mother died in his arms. He sobbed in agony as the import of what was happening struck him.

"What's this?" a voice said.

Tobin forced himself to look up through his tears as the magistrate walked back to them. "What is happening here?" the magistrate demanded once more.

"He just collapsed, sir," a trooper said.

"And interesting coincidence," the Magistrate said. "We discovered the injured girl was an abnormal. A Miraluka, possibly the last one. We euthanized her immediately, of course."

Silmari hissed and Corra cried out. The magistrate ignored them and stared at Tobin. "I understand that in times past, some abnormals would feel the pain of another one passing."

"He's the son of a Jedi," Dek Hastling said. "He's an abnormal, just like that blasted freak girlfriend of his."

"Hastling, you _ssstritsi_!" Silmari hissed.

The Devaronian curse made the human flush, but he shook his head. "The freaks were a bad idea from the beginning."

"I see," the magistrate said to Hastling. "Perhaps we can discuss your sentence further, since you appear to be an intelligent young man." He looked at Tobin. "You, on the other hand, are an abomination."

Tobin picked himself up, and grabbed a hold of the pain with all his soul. He sank deep into a dark place, a place the Sith of Korriban would have applauded. Slowly, he reached into his shirt and pulled out a large ring from his interior pocket. The magistrate stared at the ring with a mystified expression, until he saw the lettering. "What…"

Tobin slipped the ring on, and both the magistrate and the troopers saw how it shifted size to adjust to his finger. "I have trained at the hands of the last Dark Lord of the Sith," Tobin growled. "I have trained with the last of the Jedi. I am the last and greatest of both. And you just killed the woman I loved."

His two lightsabers burst out of the canisters on the back of his belt, swung around to the front of him and hovered there before his eyes. The crew of the _Fool's Prize_ backed away, while the troopers dropped into combat stance. The magistrate, however, merely stared.

"That can't be," he gaped.

Tobin ignited his sabers and sank completely into the Force.

The magistrate did not even have time to scream before Tobin vertically bisected him. The troopers around them started firing even as the survivors of the _Fool's Prize_ fell to the floor and tried to scramble away.

Sunk deeper into the Force than ever, the blaster blots seemed to Tobin to barely move through the air. He spun away from most and batted the rest back. Force-lightning slammed into the largest grouping of troopers and fried their minds even as it cooked the electrical systems of their armor.

The others were blasted from their feet by an invisible shot of power, only to be cut down by sabers before they could get to their feet.

There was no time to consider his next move. On either side of them blast doors dropped down with a heavy thud and the vents started hissing with chemicals to stop the assailants. Tobin gripped the nearest blast door in the Force and, rather than push it up, he blew it out of its tracks.

"Follow," he growled.

The survivors of the _Fool's Prize_ had no choice but to do so. They could not even arm themselves—Trooper armor was fully integrated and gene-coded to the wearer. Without the command key they could not have re-keyed the armor to work for them.

Before they even got ten feet past the shattered blast doors two e-webs dropped down from the ceiling and opened fire. Red and blue blades blurred into action, sending every shot back to its source until both guns exploded. A line of troopers led by two gray-uniformed officers turned a corner, and Tobin jumped into their midst with an animalistic growl of anger.

Behind them, the two Bards and Silmari stared in shock as troopers flew in pieces across the air. There were at least twenty of the elite fighters, and it took Tobin less than a minute to kill them. He continued down the corridor without even looking back.

"Come on!" Silmari hissed at the others. She paused only long enough to remove a blaster carbine from one of the officers. Haslo picked up the other. By the time they cleared the hall they found another blast door broken and more bodies littering the floor.

"Wonder if dad knew he could do all this," Halso said.

"I wonder…how could they do that to Klinti?" Corra asked.

"They are animals," Silmari said. They heard more screams and rushed into what looked like a mess hall. There were troopers and others in gray or white uniforms dead or dying on the floor. There was a squad of four troopers and one officer trying to take cover behind tables, but every time they ducked behind one the table shot up into the air.

If not for the look of mindless fury on Tobin's face, the onlookers might have thought he was playing with them.

They managed to duck behind one more table before the table shattered and blue lightning killed the remaining crew members.

Suddenly a mechanical monstrosity entered the hall. Silmari grabbed the others and threw them to the floor as an armored space trooper opened fire with powerful repeater blaster cannon bolts that filled the whole hall with green death. Behind came a second space trooper who unleashed a barrage of small missiles that leveled everything in the room.

The air filters immediately began sucking out the smoke. Form the center of the smoke, red and blue beams of light became visible, moments before Tobin soared through the air and removed the mechanical arms of the first trooper. He somersaulted off the chest of the armor and punched his fist.

The reinforced chestplate of the armor suit caved in with a groan and a pop, and the concussive power of the Force-blow sent the first armor flying into the second. Both toppled to the ground where Tobin made quick work of both the drivers.

Behind him, Silmari turned to the Bard kids. "Where is the traitor Hastling?"

"Don't know," Corra said.

Silmari shook her head, scrambled across the debris and bodied-filled floor, and obtained a carbine for Corra. "We must follow him."

"He's going to get us killed," Haslo said.

"Only if we're in front of him," Silmari corrected. "Come!"

Unlike the star destroyers of old that depended on crews of thousands or even tens of thousands, modern Imperial frigates had an operating crew of six hundred and another five hundred troopers. Based on the sheer, stunning number of white-armored bodies Tobin left behind, it was obvious that there were not many troopers left.

He ran into four more of the armored space troopers with their heavy mechanical suits. In the first such instance when the suit unleashed its missiles Tobin swept his hand and suddenly the missiles turned around mid-flight and tore the trooper apart. The blaster cannons were the most dangerous, but even those Tobin was able to deflect and then destroy.

The last stand of the trooper population took place at the stairs, since the internal turbolifts were disabled as part of the security. Over a hundred troopers and their uniformed officers stood ready to kill the Force-adept.

Watching once again from a relatively safe distance, Silmari almost felt sorry for the Imperials. Tobin moved faster than their eyes could follow when he lobbed a handful of stolen thermal detonators into the midst of the defensive formation.

Into the chaos caused by his efforts, the troopers had to break apart; he laid into them with swords flying and Force-powers on high. The hall filled with the sounds of screaming men and women, and other beings. Troopers were not, after all, strictly human or male.

When silence prevailed Silmari stuck her head out and saw Tobin standing amidst the destruction, covered in blood and with a feral gleam in his eye. He sensed her there and turned—she and the others sucked in their breaths. He crackled with the power of death.

"Come with me," he said. He started up the narrow metal stair case and the three had no choice but to follow.

The command deck was protected by ray shields. Tobin stood before them when the other three arrived, while on the other side they could see the ship's captain and a bevy not of troopers, but a squad of marines in light gray armor that was frankly no match for even troopers.

"You are guilty of crimes against the empire," the captain said with an arrogant sneer. "You are not going to leave this ship alive."

Suddenly the ray shield flickered off. The captain's sneer vanished. "What are you doing?" he shouted at whoever on the deck was in charge of the shields.

Tobin stepped behind the shield, and just as quickly it flickered back on.

"If you surrender, I'll spare the rest of your crew," Tobin said. Though the rage was still there, Silmari heard just an echo of the young human she knew on the _Fool's Prize_.

"Surrender?" the captain asked incredulously. "You, one man, wish me to surrender this whole ship? I think you'll find the Empire is made of sterner stuff than….aackkk!"

The captain's head suddenly, inexplicably spun around 180 degrees, until he was staring at the startled marines behind him. The marines dropped to their knees with their weapons ready.

"Who is in command now?" Tobin asked.

"Fire," the commander of the ship screamed. Before the marines could obey, Tobin held out both hands and blue lightning arced across the floor. The marines, without the fully enclosed helmets, screamed much louder than the troopers did. The screaming and the sizzling sound of the Force lightning filled the room.

In the shocked silence that followed, Tobin walked up to the stricken commander. "Surrender, and I will let the rest of your crew live."

The Umwati commander stammered. "I…I can't… Imperial protocols do not allow for surrender to …."

The Umwati's feathers stood on end as her head spun around. She did not even make a sound. Behind the ray shield, Corra jumped in shock at the ruthless death. Silmari simply nodded as Tobin moved on to the lieutenant commander.

The lieutenant commander was a Lethan Twi'lek female with a deep crimson skin tone that was rare even for her species. She was also young, not much older than he was.

"If you surrender, I will spare the rest of your crew," Tobin said one last time. His voice had become dull, as if even he were becoming sick of all the deaths.

The young officer swayed on her feet, obviously torn between fear and duty. Silmari waited tensely for her head to snap. What happened next, though, shocked them all.

The young officer fell to her knees, head down. Behind her, other crew members stood in shock. The young officer sobbed once and said, "I cannot fight you, Force-blessed. Do as the Force commands you."

"Seven hells," Haslo said. "She's a Unitarian."

"Just like Dad," Corra said.

"Soonta, you traitor!" a technician said.

Tobin did not even look up from the Twi'lek, and yet somehow the speaker's head spun around with a lethal snap like the captain's.

"There is no emotion," Tobin said.

"There is peace," the Twi'lek said from her bowed position.

"It's a lie," Tobin said then. "There is emotion. There is rage and pain and anguish and loss. I was going to let everyone on this ship live, but they took my Klinti away."

The officer prostrated herself complete. "I am sorry, Force-blessed," she cried with her face to the floor.

"Get up!" Tobin suddenly screamed.

The Twi'lek scrambled to her feet, her cheeks moist.

"Do not bow down before me like a common sandrat!" he snapped. He looked over his shoulder—through the narrow transparisteel viewports of the command deck he could see the sparkles of retreating escape pods.

He turned back to the lieutenant commander. "Your name is Soonta?"

"Yes, Force-blessed."

"You will do as I command?"

"I will."

"Order those pods back. Jam their communications immediately."

None of the remaining twenty technicians dared to speak. Tobin pointed at them. "All of you get to the hangar deck now." He finally turned his attention to the last members of the _Fool's Prize_. "Silmari, you and Haslo come with me. Corra, stay and assist Lieutenant Commander Soonta. I want all remaining crew members to assemble on the hangar deck."

"You're trusting her?" Corra asked.

"The Force guides me," Tobin said simply. "And Soonta, have the ship's housekeeping droids start cleaning up the bodies. I want all armor and weapons recovered."

"Yes, Force-blessed," the woman said.

Tobin nodded and stepped off the bridge with Silmari and Haslo Bard a step behind.


	16. The Destiny

**Chapter Sixteen: The Destiny**

"Why do you trust that one?" Silmari asked as soon as they were back in the stairwell. "She is an Imperial."

"She had an epiphany," Tobin said. His voice still sounded lifeless—his face was still blank, though splattered with blood.

"What do you mean?" Haslo asked.

"I sensed her turmoil. She was raised Unitarian. And suddenly she was faced with a Force-adept. It was a validation of a faith she thought she lost. She is now more loyal to me than she ever was to the Emperor."

"What do we do next?" Silmari asked.

"The ship is ours," Tobin said. "But to get it where I need I'll need bodies to work it. Until we can reach the Rings."

Suddenly the nearest wall com rang. "Shane?" came Corra's voice.

"My name is actually Tobin, Corra," he said. "What is it?"

"One of the pods is not returning. I think Dek is on it."

"Soonta, are you there?"

"Yes, Force-blessed."

"Destroy that pod."

"What?" Corra asked. Just the previous night, before this nightmare began, she and Dek had shared an evening meal in her quarters.

Soonta didn't care. She targeted the pod, and with a single shot of the one of the frigate's laser canons, blasted the pod out of existence. Tobin could feel the distant death in the Force and nodded.

"You didn't have to do that," Haslo said, knowing how his sister must be feeling.

"I left enemies behind on the Zabrak's ship," Tobin said. "They came back and murdered my mother. I let your captain act against my advice despite my knowing it was a trap, and I lost my love. There will be no more mercy. You will do as I say, or you will get out of my way."

Haslo took a step back, obviously startled by the transformation in Tobin.

Silmari, however, merely nodded. "As it should be, young warrior. I have never seen power like what you showed. Surely you must be Jedi or Sith."

"I'm neither, and I'm both." They stepped out into the deck plating.

"Do you think you can make the old crew serve you?" Haslo asked. "Not even you are that powerful."

"I don't need to control them," Tobin said. He sighed. "I need to terrify them into controlling themselves for us. The killing isn't over yet."

"So what are we going to do?" Haslo asked.

"That depends on if there is a 'we' or not. I have a path. It is going to be hard, but it's there for me. I can't make anyone walk that path if they do not choose to. I will tell you all this—you gave Klinti and me a home and made us feel like a part of a large family. I will never forget that. If you wish to leave, I'll make sure you leave safely so long as you do not try to stop me."

"You've proven yourself a mighty warrior," Silmari said. "It would be an honor to serve with you." There was no need to say that Vilmarn would join as well.

Tobin nodded. "The honor is mine to have you, Silmari. And the Bard clan?"

"Our mother was killed by troopers in Coronet," Haslo said. "They were after smugglers and killed twenty civilians in the process. The local Holonet hailed it as great success. We got a sympathy card from the local magistrate. Our advocate said we couldn't bring a suit against Imperial officers acting in the line of duty. We left right after that. We have no place in the Empire. And Dad supports you, so I guess our place is with you. But I can't say for sure what Corra must be thinking. She's probably going to need time. She really liked Dek."

"She'll have it, for the trip back at least," Tobin said. "I'm hurting too. I let them take Klinti away." His voice cracked. He ground his teeth until he brought it back under control. "I should have stopped them then. I made a terrible decision, and now she's gone." He had to stop speaking once more as the rage and pain boiled to the surface. He clamped down on it harshly, and funneled it into the resolve he would need to take the next step.

"We need to go to the main hangar deck."

Escape pods were trickling back into the bay when Tobin, Haslo and Silmari arrived. All told, there were perhaps forty crewmembers left, all warrant or technical officers. The troopers had fought to the last man, as had most of the officers and marines. "Line up in formation," Tobin ordered them.

The survivors glare at him angrily. Tobin searched their faces and their Force auras for the angriest one. That one, a Chiss male, suddenly shot up off the floor. He made one terrified cry before Tobin Force-pushed him through the magnetic shields that allowed shuttles to leave and land while retaining air in the hangar.

The others quickly scrambled into something resembling lines. "My name is Tobin S'Artin," he said as he strode down their ranks. He could see himself reflected in their eyes and that made his stomach clench. "You would call me an Abnormal." He allowed himself a feral grin. "I can kill everyone in this room with a thought and a wave of my hand. And if I think for an instant, if I read your souls and believe for a moment, that any of you will not do exactly as I say, I will kill you right here."

Another tech, this one an embedded Imperial intelligence officer from what Tobin sensed of his thoughts, rose suddenly from the floor. "No, no, no!" he cried as he fell toward, through, and then out of the atmospheric shields.

"I have taken this ship," Tobin said when the severity of their situation sank in on them. "It is now the _Destiny._ The two you see here are my officers, as are the others who came with me. You obey them as if they speak with my voice. If you do not, I will kill you. That is, if they don't kill you first. If you obey me, and do not attempt to contact the Empire for help, then I will allow you all to disembark unharmed at the next safe port. Do you understand me?"

There were murmurs and nods. "Do you understand me?" Tobin suddenly roared with a Force-augmented bellow.

"Yes!" came the terrified reply.

"Line up in single file," Tobin said. "Tell me your name, rank and duty station. I will tell you what your new duties are."

The first in line was a medic, and that assignment was easy.

The second was a cook, and in the back of his mind Tobin sensed access codes and a plan that no cook should have had. The cook lifted off the floor with a terrified scream and flew across the bay into space. "I can read your minds," Tobin said loudly. "Betray me, or even think of betraying me, and you'll die."

That was the last person he had to kill that day. When all the others were assigned to stations with the intent of keeping the ship flying until they could reach the Rings, Tobin made his way to the magistrate's quarters. The quarters were huge and lavishly furnished as begat a man of his status in the Empire. He ignored everything and made his way to the fresher.

The shower had real water. Tobin left his sabers on the sink counter and stepped in fully clothed. He looked down as red water poured down the drain. "I'm sorry, Klinti," he whispered to the darkness that hovered around him.

/\/\/\/\/\

Jine Hal-Aslo, Shreei, Cindee Hackstrong, Hanson Klard, Shon Blue and Dek Hastlin were all dead. More than half of the crew of the _Fool's Prize_ was gone.

Vilmarn had recovered with only minor treatments and stood next to his mate Silmari. Shindo Bard's head had a bacta patch on it and he stood straight and proud between Haslo and Corra. They five were all that remained, and constituted the new officer corps of the _Destiny_.

"The truth is all I ask," Silmari Frark said when they gathered together for a meeting in a conference room just off the command deck. "I will serve regardless." She pointed to Tobin's ring. "The magistrate was frightened by that ring. I could smell it."

Tobin studied the ring for a moment. "It was a gift from my mother—a family heirloom from when my family had to go into hiding." So far he had not revealed his lineage. As he studied them, though, he felt in his heart that the path he now followed would have them on it.

"I am a Fel," he said.

Haslo chuckled. "I'm a Gamorrean guard."

Tobin smiled without humor. "My full name is Tobin Solo Fel Artin. I am a direct descendent of the Princess Sariah Solo Fel, the daughter of Emperor Soonter Solo Fel II. Sariah was the sister of Ronan Fel I, the man who determined that those of us born with the Force were 'abnormal.' This ring is a royal Fel signet ring. It will cut the finger off anyone without Fel DNA, which is what scared the magistrate."

The five stared at Tobin for the longest time, before Corra spoke. "You mean a Fel princess was an abnormal?"

"The first Empress, Jaina Solo, was a trained Jedi knight, the daughter of a Jedi Master, and the granddaughter of a Sith Lord. Almost all the Fel descendents were gifted and trained in the Force, until Ronan Fel I. It was he who decided to destroy all Force users in the galaxy. That included his own sister, Sariah. She escaped, and her line ends with me. I am the last."

"Is this…is this the path you mentioned to Kenth back at the Rings?" Shindo Bard asked.

Tobin nodded. "I just never thought I'd walk it without Klinti."

None dared to respond to the visceral pain in Tobin's voice. He stared into space for a moment before he abruptly returned his attention to those around the table. "I follow the Force. Right now, I need a crew for this ship. I want to make the Empire notice who I am. In time, maybe more." He nodded to where droids continued the process of cleaning up the bodies beyond the small window of the conference room. "I never want to do anything like this again. But I may have to. Children are being murdered because of their affinity to the Force. I was condemned to die at age ten when my mother took me underground. No more. It's got to end. The Force itself demands it. That's what I want."

"And for us?" Corra said.

"You're officers aboard this ship as long as you want to stay," Tobin said. "I said it before—you welcomed Klinti and I and made us feel like a part of your family. I will always remember that. I trust those of you in this room over any others in the galaxy."

"I'm afraid to ask this," Haslo said, "but do we have to become Unitarian too?"

"How could you not believe after today?" Shindo demanded of his son.

Tobin, though, shook his head. "It is not for me or any other to tell you what to believe, Haslo. I know the Force exists for it flows strongly within me. Your father knows because, even before me, he had faith in it. If you come to believe in its power, the others will welcome you. If not, you still have a place on this ship if you choose to take it."

The five seemed to accept that in stride. "It will not be easy," Silmari finally said. "These ones around us do as you say because the fear is fresh. But it is hard for six to control so many."

"That's why we're heading to the Rings first," Tobin said. "I want to recruit a crew—the best we can find. Shindo, you and Kenth will be key to that. And then I want to start hitting targets and hitting them hard. Whatever else may be true, the five of you are going to be very rich."

After the meeting, Tobin wandered through the mostly empty halls. In his mind, he could sense the fear and muted conversations from the Imperial crew members. He ignored them since he felt no sabotage or betrayal yet, and continued toward the medical bay.

The three ship medics who survived the onslaught were working on two Imperials injured by Tobin himself. All three stopped what they were doing when he stepped in. "I want to see her," he said.

The medics all shared a glance, before the shortest stepped forward. She pulled down a mask to reveal the dark blue eyes, olive skin and facial tattoos of a Mirialan. "You killed over a thousand people," she said.

"Yes I did," Tobin said.

"Are you proud?"

One of the other medics hissed, "Shina, are you insane?"

The medic named Shina simply stared up at Tobin, and he found himself staring back at her. "Medics like you have murdered children like me for centuries. Are you proud of that?"

Shina shook her head. "No, I'm not." She turned abruptly and walked across the medical bay to a wall of large steel drawers. She pulled one out, and Klinti lay on it still in her burned spacer clothes. She empty eyes were exposed. Her face was relaxed and terribly pale, while the skin at the back of her head had darkened.

"How was she killed?"

"She was injected with a muscular paralytic that stopped her heart," Shina said, "directly upon the Magistrates orders. She never recovered consciousness, and from what I could see of her cerebral scans she did not feel any pain from the shot."

"No, I felt it instead," Tobin whispered. He turned to the medic. "You gave her the shot?"

Shina lifted her chin. "I did. I am senior medic, and I wasn't going to have my staff kill a defenseless patient for me. Are you going to kill me? Are a thousand souls not enough to quench your thirst for revenge?"

"When a blaster kills your loved one," Tobin said softly, "do you curse the blaster, or the murderer who wielded it? You did your duty. You did not make the decision to kill her." He studied the woman carefully. "And it enraged you to have to do so."

He touched Klinti's cold, pale cheek. "She saw this. I took this path, and she knew this would happen. She told me not to let go of her." He leaned down and brushed his lips to her cold, unyielding ones. "I told her I would protect her. I promised not to let go. And yet I let you take her from me. I'm so sorry, Klinti."

"You know now it's much easier to take a life than to save one," Shina said without even a hint of pity. "You promised what you couldn't deliver."

He straightened and orange fire flashed in his eyes while blue sparks played about his fingers. Shina backed up a step. "Get out," he said. "All of you. Get out."

The other medics assisted the patients out. Shina was the last to leave.

He stood alone over the body. Over Klinti. He looked up and remembered the many lessons of the Sith, relayed not only by Valus, but also by Darth Sidious himself. Especially he remembered the lesson of Darth Plagueis that Sidious relayed to him. He remembered the story of Cade Skywalker, who could use the Force to restore life itself.

His hands were in motion before the thought even finished rolling through his mind. His fingers came to rest on Klinti's chest. She felt terribly cold.

He sank so deep into the Force he almost lost himself. Every shining mote of power he could gather from the Force and the lives of all those around him coalesced around his hands and poured into the cold body before him.

Klinti's body took on an orange glow as the warmth of the Force filled her. "Breathe," Tobin commanded. "Breathe," he prayed.

For all the powers at his command, this one gift was beyond him. No matter how much power he poured into the vessel of her body, it simply spilled back out again. He could not bring her back.

His rage ignited the power around him like a match igniting accelerant. The room exploded in a swirl of Force energy that threw objects crashing around him, tipped tables and shattered lights. Above all he lifted his head and screamed out all the rage and anger he felt for the Universe, for the Empire, for the Force.

For himself, at letting her go. For breaking his promise to her.

The Force storm subsided. Somehow he was on the floor. Somehow Klinti was cradled in his arms, her head against his shoulders. Somehow tears poured down his cheeks so thickly he could not see.

"I'm sorry," he whispered to her as he rocked her gently in his arms. "I'm so sorry."

If at that moment, even a single trooper had attacked him, he would surely have died. There was no Force now, nor power. He could not have summoned any type of defense at that moment. However, the only eyes on him were those of the medic, Shina. She said nothing as she backed out into the hall and allowed the door to close.

Tobin never noticed.

/\/\/\/\/\

Tobin left the medical bay an hour later. The medics and patients stayed out of sight, though he could feel them a few hallways down. He felt fear, and in one, pity.

The pity angered him, but he said nothing as he turned the other way and strolled through the ship. He encountered many signs of his handiwork in scorches on the wall, or flamed out energy nodes or ray shield generators. The bodies were gone, but the servitor droids were still working on cleaning the blood from the walls.

He went this time to the captain's room and sat behind the dead man's desk for the longest time. He knew there were things he needed to do, and yet he found he could not make himself do them.

The door opened, and Silmari stepped in. "I heard the medical bay was redecorated," she said.

Tobin was surprised to find his throat sore from screaming. "It's not a good time."

"I know," the Devaronian said. Her elfin ears drooped a little, and from the Force he sensed it was in sympathy. "I lost my clan mother when I was young to Imperials. I thought I would die with the pain. But I did not." She stepped to one of the chairs in front of the desk.

"You are a powerful warrior," she said. "But you are young. Don't let your youth destroy you. She is gone. Honor her memory, and fulfill your destiny."

"I let her go."

Silmari nodded. "And she died. You did not kill her. They did. And you killed many in return. The blood debt has been paid tenfold. Don't let the smell of the blood blind you. Do what you need to do, or give up now and leave the ship." She stood and left.

Tobin stared after her for perhaps ten minutes. He remembered the feel of Klinti's lips the first time they kissed as man and woman; the first time they made love. He remembered the heavy coldness of her body as he lifted her back onto the cooler platform.

His fists slammed down on the desk, and a drawer popped open. It held a single flimsiplast. He immediately recognized hand-written security codes. Tobin shook his head at the predictability of some people.

He lost his pain in the moment-to-moment flow of work. He quickly had the captain's personal logs open and began to scroll through the ship's personnel files. With the code keys it was simply to switch the computer and ship security codes. It was easy to access personnel files. He was surprised to see that the Medic named Shina had already gone through and updated the files of those deceased. It aided him in narrowing the list down to the survivors.

Late on the second day of his term as Captain, Tobin began calling crew to the captain's quarters. The first one he called was Sor'ai Soonta, Unitarian among Imperials. She came in slowly, as if walking to her doom. Tobin motioned for her to take one of the two seats before the captain's desk. "Please sit," he said.

Sor'ai Soonta sat on the very edge of the seat, as if about to jump. "Were you born Unitarian?"

"Yes, Force-blessed."

"For the sake of convenience, please call me captain for now."

"Yes, Captain."

"Are you from Ryloth?"

"I am from Naos III."

"Is there a large Unitarian sect there?"

"There was."

Tobin nodded—it was a familiar story. "You were placed into an Imperial home for youth. Due to exceptional academic performance you were drafted into the Empire at age 16 for the officer training corps. I understand that mandatory military service is part of the Imperial youth homes."

"It is," Soonta said. "I had no choice but to join, and if I had to serve I chose to serve as an officer."

"And you were doing very well. You graduated the four year academy in two years with top honors. You were put on a fast track program that was probably going to end with you serving in the Moff's College. You made lieutenant commander by twenty three with many predicting a rise to moff in your future—and you've not received a single promotion since. You are twenty-six now."

She bowed her head and said nothing.

"I've reviewed your personnel records. You've been passed over for promotion three times despite good scores on your competency tests. Why?"

The question caught her completely off guard. "I don't…" She stopped.

Her fear poured off in waves. "I do not kill without reason, Sor'ai," Tobin said. "Those men I killed in the hangar bay were planning to contact Imperial forces or otherwise compromise my position on this ship. I killed them to protect myself and my crew. I do not kill out of spite."

He swung the captain's terminal around. "You were passed over because you refused to sleep with the captain."

Sor'ai's already red cheeks turned nearly purple as she blushed. "He would never have said that in his logs," she muttered.

"I see it in your mind. He first tried to use your religion to entice you to his bed, and then the promise of promotions. Obviously neither tactic worked."

"And you wish for my flesh now?" she asked in a tremulous voice.

For a moment Tobin blinked both in surprise and dismay. He could clearly sense that she would give herself to him without hesitation, because he was Force-blessed. She was Klinti's age.

"I will never ask that of you," he said. "I need a crew, Sor'ai. I've been reviewing personnel records, and there are some whom I will offer a berth to, if they wish it. I am offering one to you. If you stay, you will be a member of my crew with nothing to fear from me ever again. Additionally, one of my people is Unitarian, and I will likely have more aboard soon. The port I am going has a large, healthy sect on it. Think about it, and decide in the next day."

He met and offered berths to another five Imperials, including all the medics. None said no to his face, but he sensed that only four were really considering it, including, surprisingly, the chief medic.

Twice more he visited Klinti, though without any further demonstrations. He could not decide what to do with her body, and frankly did not want to make a decision regarding her at all. She was the first woman he had loved, and it was because of him that she died. He was surprised when he felt the Medic, Shina, walk into the room.

"Leave," he said coldly.

"In a minute," she said.

He turned to stare, ready to snap her neck in an instant. Still, the medic did not back down. "I researched Miraluka funeral rites," she said. "After the Empire destroyed their homeworld of Alpheridies, the surviving Miraluka on Katarr evacuated and became space nomads. They survived as such for two centuries, and during those centuries their funeral practices changed. According to the account of an Imperial sociologist, the Miraluka shot their dead into the nearest star so that they could join the light they could not see in life."

"I thought the Empire banned material on Force-sensitive species," he said.

"Magistrates and medics were exempted to better identify them," Shina said with a shrug. "How…hold old was she?"

"She was twenty-six. She was the very last of her kind." His voice broke and he had to bow his head in silence.

"Do you wish me to make the arrangements?"

Tobin held her burnt hand. It was icy cold. Her face was so very pale, and her vestigial sockets had sunk so very deeply. She no longer even looked like the woman he loved. "Yes," he finally was able to say.

"I will," Shina said.

"You still wish to stay aboard?" he finally noted.

"Yes. My family was from Corusca originally. We were forced to flee when the Galactic Alliance fell. My ancestor continued to fight with the Alliance Remnant until it was finally absorbed into the Imperial Senate. My family has long memories."

"And yet here you are."

"As a medic," she reminded him.

Tobin gently pushed Klinti's drawer back into the wall cooler unit. "Please take care of her as her people would wish," he said. He turned and left the room without saying anything else to the medic.


	17. Return to the Rings

**Chapter Seventeen: Returning to the Rings**

On the third day after Tobin took the ship, they arrived at the Rings and were immediately met by alarm. Within moments of their reversion from hyperspace, smaller freighters started blasting away from the station. On the command deck, Silmari snickered as only a furry Devaronian could. "Like _ssistari_ scattering before a _harshtra_."

"Prey before the hunter," Tobin said, translating. He stood at the communications station and flicked a holo feed. "Ring Authority, this is Captain Tobin S'Artin aboard the newly liberated free trade ship _Destiny._ We are not hostile. Requesting docking berth and trade rights."

The response was immediate as a Chagrian controller appeared on the holovid. "_Destiny_, this is Docking Control. We do not recognize your name or your captain."

"We are the survivors of the _Fool's Prize_ under Captain Hal-Aslo. The captain and the ship were lost. We took this ship in recompense."

The Chagrian grinned a toothy smile. "That is some compensation, _Destiny._ We are registering you now. Coordinates for docking will follow."

"Thank you, Control. Please also spread the word that we will be recruiting for berths."

"Will do. Control out."

"That went well," Corra Bard noted.

"Every pirate with a big ship aids in the defense of the Rings," Tobin said. "Aside from the Zabrak and one or two others, we now have one of the biggest ships on the block."

As they prepared to slave the ship's insertion jets to the Dock Control, Tobin motioned for Shindo. The older man walked over. "I need you to go to Kenth. Tell him that we have a ship now—that the path I mentioned has begun. I'll need a crew, at least a few hundred, that I can count on."

Shindo nodded resolutely. "If anyone can get you a crew, it'll be Kenth Shandor. The man's a former trooper."

Tobin blinked in genuine surprise. "Really?"

Tobin did not dare disembark from the ship when they docked. As understaffed as he was, it would not take that many people to "liberate" his recently liberated ship. Instead, he made sure all the security codes were switched over to his personal coding, and then ordered all the Imperial personnel except those handful who had accepted his offer of berths to the brig.

It was crowded as they stepped into the cells. "I will be obtaining a full crew shortly," Tobin told them when the restraining fields activated. "After that, I will release you all on a moon sufficiently far away to make locating us difficult. If you stay quiet and make no attempt to sabotage my operations, you will be free in just a few days. In the meantime, droids will ensure you are fed."

When the old crew was taken care of and Shindo was on his way to the Unitarian temple, Tobin contacted the Ring shipwright's guild via the local holo relay. He was not surprised to find the Wookiee in charge of the Guild eagerly awaiting the call. Everyone in the dock saw the breach in the hull caused by Jine's volley of torpedos.

"You are Captain S'Artin?' the Wookiee's implanted translator said.

"You are the Guildmaster?"

"We observed your new ships has damage."

"Indeed. How much for a full repair?"

When Wookiees grinned, it looked as if they were about to rip your throat out. "Two hundred thousand for full repair on ship of that size. It will take three weeks."

"May it one and I will double your price."

"You have this much?"

"I will shortly."

The Wookiee grunted, which translated into, "Excellent. We require half as a deposit. The second half upon your satisfaction of the job completion."

"I'll have the deposit within the day. May I have your name, Guildmaster?"

"I have no proper name," the Wookiee said. "I was taken from my world as a cub. My name has always been my title."

Tobin nodded, suspecting as much. The Wookiees removed from Shyriiwook while cubs often refused to take proper Wookiee names. They often felt unworthy. "Then I look forward to a profitable relationship, Guildmaster."

"As do I."

Another thing from his list to check off. He left the captain's office and stepped onto the now mostly empty command deck. Corra and Sor'ai Soonta, the former Imperial, were the only ones there and were talking softly. Both looked up when Tobin joined them in silence.

Through the transparisteel of the deck viewports he could see the bay walls running beside the ship. The frigate was 600 meters, but even so was completely dwarfed by the scale of the bay around him, and he knew this wasn't even one of the larger bays.

"Captain," Soonta said. She still spoke timidly; as if afraid he would kill her at any minute. "There is a large crowd approaching."

Tobin nodded. "Yes. Hopefully that's our new crew."

Tobin walked down to the cargo ramp and used his personal security code to open the airlock. He was met by a crowd of easily 700 beings of various races. At their forefront stood Shindo Bard, Kenth Shandor, and Soola Dayaala.

Rather than look expectant, both Shandor and Dayaala looked profoundly sad. It was Shandor who spoke first. "Shindo told me of your loss, Force-blessed. I grieve for you."

"Thank you," Tobin said, fighting to maintain control. "Do you know why I asked you here?"

"You need a crew," Shandor said with a nod. "Not all of these people are of the Faith, but all are trustworthy. I've worked with most, and the rest were vouched for by people I trust. You will find among them fighters, slicers, engineers and technicians. Some are former troopers such as myself, or former Navy."

"What's the story behind that?" Tobin said. "Most troopers are for life."

Shandor ground his jaw. "Unlike many of my brethren, I was not born to a Unitarian sect. I found my way to the Faith after I was called upon by a magistrate to assist in the murder of a Force-blessed child. I tried to assist the girl—she was only six. She was shot in the back while running and I stayed in a penal colony for ten years. It was while I served my time that I discovered the Faith."

"And if you come with me, what of the Sect here?"

"I've left it in the hands of Afton Shrief," Kenth said. "Our Baroli brothers are strong in the faith. We've welcomed them and they have already made this place their home. They told me what you did for them. And they have testified to all others as well."

Another miracle for the masses, Tobin thought to himself. He nodded before turning his attention to the hundreds standing on the ramp. "I don't know how much Kenth has told you," he said to the crowd, "but I took this ship from Imperial forces just a few days ago after our old ship was destroyed. And I wish to be clear—I took it by myself."

"I vouch for that," Shindo added loudly. "He is Force-blessed, and by the power of the Force overthrew the Imperials."

Tobin nodded. "This ship is now the _Destiny_. It will be more than just a pirate ship. It will be the first in a fleet that may someday change the Empire. If you come aboard, you will become more than just pirates. You will become the first soldiers for a new galaxy. If that is not a future you wish to be a part of, then you should go home now."

No one left, and with that Tobin turned and led them back into the main cargo bay of the ship. Having been recently outfitted at an Imperial station, the cargo bay was filled with munitions and food stuffs.

Tobin began interviewing immediately. Kenth was easy—his experience was invaluable. Not only was he a former trooper, but he had already shown Tobin that he was a charismatic leader. Though he was less sure about Soola, Shindo assured Tobin that the former teacher was an able programmer.

Tobin, watching the body language of the two, understood that a relationship had formed. "Just make sure she's not under your direct command," Tobin warned the two. He tried not to smile at the near violet blush on the blue-skinned Twi'lek. "I know how hard it is to command someone you care for."

Shindo and Soola both nodded their thanks.

In the end Tobin took five hundred applicants. Those he couldn't use due to room constraints or redundancies in skill sets, he took information for. "Chances are, we'll need you eventually," he promised them.

When the rejected applicants left and those selected waited in the hold for assignment Tobin turned to Kenth. "How familiar are you with frigates?"

"They haven't changed the design in twenty years," Kenth said. "I specialized in ship-to-ship boarding actions, so this is like coming home."

Tobin nodded. "One of the Imperial officers was a Unitarian. Sor'ai Soonta. She is young, but well trained from her record. I've already coded you into the ship as a lieutenant commander. She retains her rank."

"Who is your second?"

"A female Devaronian named Silmari," Tobin decided on the fly. The moment he said it, the decision felt right. "She will need training, but she has the instincts I need and I trust her. However, you, Shindo and Soonta will likely find yourselves commanding your own ships soon if all goes well. In the meantime, I need to see about the ship's finances."

"The Imperial and I will get the men sorted," Kenth said with the confidence that only came from experience and success.

"I know," Tobin said with a grateful smile. He left the table and walked through the curious crewmen. Now that he had little to fear of his ship being stolen, he felt better leaving it in its berth. As much as he hated working with the money, he knew he had no choice but to do so.

He emerged on a low-level promenade looking over the valley floor. This was the lowest on the rings he had ever gone. The valley floor was only fifty meters or so below him. He could hear the sound of water running over rocks, and saw beings of all species walking along the river in the narrow path that the designers incorporated between the fields of grains. The air tasted fresher this low as well.

"Klinti would have loved the smell," Tobin said softly. It took an effort of will to shake the sudden sadness and continue on his way. He ignored the bloom sellers and the jewelry store with determination until he reached a vertical tram.

When he reached the bank, he took a deep breath to prepare himself. The bank was one of the larger structures on its level and jutted out onto the walkway with stark, utilitarian angles. With no reason to delay, he walked in. He was immediately faced with the receptionist, a Muun female. He requested a meeting with an account manager, and within moments was escorted by a security droid to the Muun banker.

"How can I be of service, Gentle Being?"

Tobin sat at the proffered chair and handed over his ident chip. "I need an account summary."

The banker quickly pulled up the summary, confirming that between he and Klinti the account had close to a hundred and twenty thousand credits.

"You also held the corporate accounts for the _Fool's Prize_ under Captain Jine Hal-Aslo," Tobin said.

The Muun banker shrugged. "Perhaps."

Tobin reached out with the Force and pushed at the being's mind. "I am the captain's heir. Transfer all funds from those account into mine."

The Muun did not even blink his large, glassy eyes. "Of course," it said pleasantly. "I show a total balance of three point eight million credits has now been transferred to your account."

"Delete all record of the transfer and close the _Fool's Prize_ account," Tobin said.

"Of course," the Muun said as he complied.

"Forget this conversation," Tobin said at last.

The Muun blinked. "What were we discussing?"

"My accounts," Tobin said casually. "I need a credit draw for repairs and crew salary on the _Destiny_. Direct draw only. I don't wish to run a line of credit beyond my balance at this time."

"It appears your account is in good standing and should be sufficient for your needs," the Muun said gaily.

"Then please transfer two hundred thousand credits to the Guildmaster of the Shipwright's Guild as deposit for the repairs of the _Destiny_."

"I shall do so gladly."

Tobin nodded and made other withdraws in credit chits, since he wasn't sure of how he was going to obtain the rest of what he needed yet. "And that is all I needed."

The Muun stood and bowed. "Then I thank you for your business this day, Sir."

Tobin walked out of the bank a rich man, but felt strangely empty. For some reason, he looked down at right his hand and wondered why it felt cold. A moment later he realized it was because Klinti was not holding it.

When the Force warned him and he looked up to see the Zabrak and a raiding party of forty beings coming toward him, he felt oddly empty, but not surprised. The Zabrak was so mad he was actually stomping with each step, and his men already had their weapons out.

"S'Artin!" he roared. His voice boomed across the promenade in front of the bank and brought the attention of every being there. "I knew you'd be showing your face again. You are dead! You are a dead man!"

Tobin stood and waited to see if the Zabrak would fire first. He knew from the other pirates on the _Fool's Prize_ and from Klinti herself that Ring Authority did not get involved unless there were deaths. But the station was fiercely independent as well, with an established philosophy of every being for himself. If they fired on him first, Tobin was justified to take any action he needed.

He trembled with the desire to take that action. He could almost feel the Zabrak's blood on his hands. However, the Force was whispering to him. Telling him that it wasn't the right time.

He activated his lightsabers, red and blue, and the approaching party came to an abrupt, stumbling stop. Tobin walked toward them while all around him he felt eyes on his back. He ignored them and continued to stare down at the pirate captain. "Zabrak," he said calmly.

The Zabrak's lips trembled in rage. His voice came out as a low growl. "You stole my shuttle and my slicer!"

"You aided in the murder of my mother," Tobin said calmly. "And Klinti is dead now too. Killed by Imperials when the _Fool's Prize_ was lost. "

Zabrak blinked. If he was saddened by the loss of his long-time crewmate, it didn't show. "I should have killed you."

"You tried once and lost more than three quarters of your men," Tobin said. He looked at the wide-eyed raiders behind the Zabrak. "I'm in a bit of a mood. I wouldn't mind a small diversion. Please feel free to try again. Take a shot. I beg you too."

One of the Zabrak's more enthusiastic raiders evidently got tired of the talk, raised a blaster, and fired. Tobin let go of his red blade and held out a hand. The blaster bold impacted his palm with no visible impact, while the saber continued to float by his head.

The shooter stared a moment before his head suddenly jerked around. He fell boneless to the floor while his colleagues backed away in terror. The Zabrak stared at the fallen man, then back to Tobin. "Does anyone else wish to take a shot," Tobin asked.

"Kriffing freak," the Zabrak said.

Tobin leaned forward as if to impart an important secret. "I took that Imperial frigate single-handedly. I killed nearly everyone aboard by myself because of what they did to Klinti. If I can kill over a eight hundred armed troopers and Imperial navel officers, I can kill you and your men just as easily. Do you wish to challenge me, Zabrak?"

Zabrak finally said. "You've made your point."

"I wonder if I have," Tobin said. "If you ever challenge me again, I won't just kill you, I will destroy your very soul." He stepped forward, and realized with a sense of surprise that he was now almost able to look the huge figure in the face. "Do we have an understanding, Captain?"

Zabrak studied Tobin very carefully. "We have an understanding," he said grimly. "Just don't turn your back on me."

"Or what?" Tobin said. Slowly, flagrantly, Tobin turned his back on the Zabrak and walked away.

sp

/\/\/\/\/\

sp

The repairs on the _Destiny_ proceeded with brutal efficiency. The Shipswright Guild consisted primarily of former Wookiee indentured servants who had served through their term and did not wish to return to their home in shame. These were often the same beings that built the ships in the first place, and they did first-rate work. The repairs continued without pause in rotating shifts, working both inside and out, until the job was completed within the contracted week.

Tobin paid the agreed price gratefully, knowing the ship could not have received better care in an Imperial shipyard.

The week was spent training and indoctrinating his crew. Tobin observed the training sessions, since he had no more idea how to operate the ship than many of his recruits. Fortunately, other recruits were either long-time spacers or former Imperials themselves, and Lieutenant Commanders Soonta and Shandor had little difficulty in giving the crew basic training.

The only one spot of difficulty was Silmari. "I am honored, but confused," she said in the magistrate's quarters which Tobin had claimed. "Why am I your commander?"

"Because I trust you," Tobin said. "And because I know, without a doubt, that if I told you to take your weapon and shoot Shindo Bard in the head, you would do it. Wouldn't you?"

"Well, yes. I have given my allegiance to you. It is the way of my people."

"It is the will of the Force," Tobin said. "Your job is to enforce my will on this ship. Shandor and Soonta's jobs are to make sure that will is carried out. Learn from them—how to do your job. But it is your job."

Tobin had many interesting experiences that week, including contacting the Shipping Authority for his own shipping list. This he achieved through Shindo, who had done it once or twice for Captain Hal-Aslo. Their contact was a wiry Bith who promised them great riches.

Tobin stared at the gray-skinned creature and felt that the list would at best provide little, and at worst get them caught. "I would like another list," he said before Shindo paid the creature. "Print one right now from your ongoing traffic report."

"But sir…"

Tobin pushed in the Force without any hesitation, quickly overcoming the creature's mind. They left ten minutes later with a genuine shipping list that no pirate had seen before, while the Bith had no memory of handing the list over.

Two days after that the last of Tobin's purchases arrived. Vilmarn Frahk and Haslo Bard appeared around a corner in a transport van with two speeder-sized lumps on the van bed behind them. Each object was easily the size of the transport itself, and had a sickly black appearance with tentacles.

"You found them," Tobin said.

"We did, young one!" Vilmarn said with a toothy grin.

"And it only took half of your account to get them," Haslo added with a giddy laugh. "We've also got their tanks and integration units."

"Let's get them loaded, then, and move out," Tobin said.

The three entered the main loading ramp of the frigate, and minutes later were flying out of the station.


	18. The Dread Pirate Tobin

**Chapter Eighteen: The Dread Pirate Tobin**

Moff Dila Hershied sipped her caf and nibbled a pastry as she surveyed the morning reports. Another ten children were euthanized due to high midichlorian counts around her sector, she noted with distaste.

She had a brief report that a pirate ship was successfully destroyed in a joint operation between her people and their contacts on the Rings. She made a note on her holopad to inquiry as to why the captain had not filed an after-action report, and continued reading.

Dila Hershied was the epitome of the modern Imperial woman. Educated in the finest schools and descended from a long line of Imperial officers, Hershied took great pride in both her office and her person. Just three years shy of 50, she was young to hold such a powerful position, but the Emperor's trust in her was repaid tenfold. Her troopers and officer corps were wildly loyal because she rewarded them well. Piracy was kept to less than two percent of all shipping traffic within her space, and any time it exceeded that standard, she made sure to take steps.

The pirate elite respected her limits and often times worked with her to cull out the younger, more aggressive pirate captains. In this way, she and her people profited from generous bribes, which were officially registered and taxed in the name of the Emperor, and the pirates were allowed to serve their function as the bottom-feeders of the Empire.

Her latest pet lieutenant knocked and waited patiently at the door to her inner office. His name was Davin, and he was one of the better lovers she had enjoyed over the past few years. She looked up now expecting to see his pretty features set in a pleasant smile. However, he actually appeared serious.

"Yes, Davin?"

"I'm sorry to disturb you, Moff Hershied, but you're receiving a red-band call."

Red-band? "Very well, please put the call through, Lieutenant."

Davin bowed with curt military manners. She would show him later that she never begrudged the messengers of their bad tidings. For now, though, she activated the red-band channel and watched as the three-dimensional figure of the pirate leader named Aleusa formed on her desk.

"I trust this is important?" Hershied did not believe in brash threats. Aleusa knew she could destroy the pirates at will.

"I am sorry to have to disturb you, Dila," Aleusa said. The pirate leader was one of the few in the galaxy who dared use the Moff's name, and one of the few allowed to get away with it. "Zabrak had an encounter with an old friend. The Abnormal we attempted to kill on Korriban is still alive."

Hershied slowly sipped her caf in an effort to hide her surprise. The motion not only hid the surprise, but also gave her time to quickly overcome it. When she spoke, her voice was calm and composed as it should have been. "I was under the impression that there were two abnormals, male and female, and that two such bodies were recovered."

"Evidently there was a second male. The boy's name is Tobin S'Artin. And he came to the Rings in one of your frigates. He claimed to have taken the ship single-handedly when the _Fool's Prize_ was dealt with. Zabrak recognized him and we tried to detain him, but he threatened the whole raiding party."

Hershied reviewed the notes on her pad, specifically about the missing after-action report. Then the pirate's last words caught her attention. "He threatened the raiding party, and Zabrak actually backed off?"

"Dila, one of the raiders took a shot at Tobin. The abnormal caught the blaster bolt in his bare hand and then broke the shooter's neck from thirty paces away," Aleusa clarified. "In front of the whole station. Ring Security even caught it on a holocam."

Hershied felt a knot form in her stomach. "He caught a blaster bolt?"

"He claims to have the powers of both the Jedi and the Sith," Aleusa said. "The Zabrak was shaken. We tried to sneak a few people in as crew, but S'artin recruited his own people and we never had a chance."

"What about the Imperial crew of the ship?"

"Mostly dead. There were a few survivors that he's supposedly going to set free. Probably on Telos. I thought you would want to know this."

Hershied was nothing if not gracious. "You were right to call, Aleusa. Thank you. If you have any images, send them. And spread the word—this Tobin S'Artin is a wanted man, and no quarter will be given to anyone who allies themselves with him."

Aleusa's smile looked predatory. "I will personally ensure everyone knows. And I'm sending the security recordings now."

Aleusa's face disappeared, replaced moments later b a 2-D image taken from a security cam. The figures were small due to distance, even after the cam zoomed in. She saw a young-looking man with a head of dark hard holding two glowing sabers in each hand. Across from him was obviously the Zabrak's raiding party. They appeared to be speaking about something.

A moment later, one of the raiders fired. Hershied put her caf down as she watched the young man let go of one of his sabers and catch the bolt. She didn't know what was more disturbing—that he caught the bolt bare handed, or that his saber continued to float in the air by his head.

She placed the recording into her private, encrypted files and marked it as "Pirating Activity". She then entered the transmission log and deleted all trace of the call or the recording in the official logs.

Once that was done, Hershied leaned back in her seat. After a moment of consideration, she entered a restricted holonet database using her Moff-level security clearance and entered the name S'Artin. Immediately she saw images of a young boy taken from school records, along with the images of an attractive young woman with coppery-red hair.

The young woman, she noted, was a supposedly trained as a Jedi, and was herself the only child of a Jedi killed twenty five years before. Dila followed the allegations back through the restricted database, almost a hundred years, when she hit a sudden wall of restricted access not even her security could penetrate. Security blocks of that level came from Corusca only, and she had no desire to call Imperial attention to her actions with anything other than glowing reports.

She cancelled the historical line of inquiry and instead pulled up the full report from the boy in question. What she saw made her put her caf down and lean forward. The midichlorian count was completely unprecedented at nearly forty thousand per cell. Again, she accessed the restricted database and searched for anything comparable.

Only two names appeared: Anakin Skywalker, and his son Luke. Both had counts over twenty-thousand, but just barely, and were considered the most powerful Jedi of their times. One caused the downfall of the Jedi, and the other brought down the first Emperor and rebuilt the Order.

Her finger edged toward the blue-band holo address that would put her in contact with Grand Moff Dinteri, but she hesitated and finally changed her mind. What the Grand Moff didn't know about would not harm him, or Hershied herself.

~~Last Jedi~~

The convoy dropped out of hyperspace without warning. The five ships of the Imperial-chartered Trade Union came almost to a halt under powerful gravity shadows. In front of the convoy rested a single Imperial frigate. Captain Con'Sholti opened a channel to immediately demand to know why their ships were stopped.

The face of a young man in a captain's uniform appeared on the lead ship's screen. "This is Captain S'Artin of the Imperial Frigate _Destiny_. We have reason to believe your ships have been rigged with explosives by the Free Trade Alliance. The explosives use a materiel known as Dueternium-82. We're sending the chemical sensor profile now. Please scan all your ships immediately to determine if you have any of this material on board."

Con'Sholti tried to control his fear. The Skakoan's hand unconsciously lifted to his pressure mask while his navigator performed the scan. When completed, the human navigator leaned to one side to allow Con'Sholti to see the results.

"Great Creator!" Con'Sholti said. "Our ships are filled with this material!"

The Imperial captain leaned forward urgently. "Evacuate now! Get off those ships while you can! The Free Trade terrorist we found died before he could tell us how long it takes for the explosives to detonate!"

"Evacuate the ship!" Con'Sholti cried out. "All ships evacuate!"

In minutes escape pods poured from the five ships. Con'Sholti was among the first out. He turned to the rear viewport of his escape pod and watched for the explosion. It did not come immediately. Instead he saw the frigate move forward with an open hangar. It towed the first of the convoy ships in, and then towed a second, and finally a third, until its hangar was at capacity.

It then pulled the other to ships to its outer hull and secured them with grapple beams. Con'Shulti turned and pushed aside the pod's pilot to hit the communication switch. "_Destiny,_ what are you doing?"

"Stealing from you," came the calm reply. "For future reference, Captain, Dueternium-82 is another name for transparisteel. You were scanning your own viewports. Good day, Captain." A moment later, the ship went to full sublight and started to recede from Con'Shulti's view.

The captain of the convoy stepped back in shock. "I am so fired," he finally said.

~~Last Jedi~~

The mood on board the _Destiny_ was jubilant when they flew away from the escape pods. According to the shipping manifests, the convoy was carrying supplies to the Kuati shipyards, including munitions, droids and foodstuffs for the station personnel.

The mood lasted only long enough for the crew to realize they were not heading toward the Rings. In fact, the ship was heading toward the outer rim in regions that were once known as Wild Space.

"This heading does not register in the navicomp," Soonta noted.

Silmari shrugged. "The captain gave them to me personally. I don't know where they go either."

It took more power than normal for the ship to make hyperspace with their heavy load, and could only go at the slowest rating without risking structural integrity while towing two ships outside of their landing bay. Still, after ten hours of flight Tobin stepped onto the command deck. Like the others on board, Tobin wore what looked like an Imperial uniform. His pants legs had a single white stripe along the gray seams, and that was the only difference.

The other uniforms were being converted as well using the ship's stores and the lone quartermaster droid on board. Those whose uniforms hadn't been converted simply wore whatever the droid had in stock.

"We'll be there in a few minutes," Tobin said.

"Where?" Shindo asked. Shindo was a lieutenant, just like his children Corra, Haslo, and Simlari's mate Vilmarn.

"I don't know," Tobin said honestly enough.

The whole command deck turned and stared at him as if he were insane, but he merely shrugged. "The Force told me where to go."

A few minutes later, the captain said, "Bring us out of hyperspace and scan for planets."

Soonta did as he asked and those on the deck watched as space beyond their viewports lost the twirling blue chaos of the other realm and reverted back to the normal starscape of space. However, taking up much of the front of their view was a glistening blue and green orb.

"A planet," Soonta said, stating the obvious. "M-class with a single moon. The moon appears to be mineral rich."

"Is the planet inhabited?" Silmari asked.

Before Soonta could answer, Tobin said quietly, "No, it's not. It's uncharted and unexplored. It thrums with life, but no intelligence."

"How did you find it?" Corra asked.

"He is Force-blessed," Soonta said. The young Lieutenant Commander answered as if the truth were obvious. "Captain, the star itself has an astrography designation only. It's never been properly named."

"Sestia," Tobin said. "The system is Sestia. I sense there are other worlds in the system—some are mineral rich, including at least one gas-giant."

"Yes, that is correct, captain," Soonta said as she continued to read the navigation chart. "This is the third planet."

"Then this is Sestia III," Tobin said. "And we are now officially part of the Sestia Navy. Congratulations, everyone."

There were nervous laughs around the command deck. Many were staring at Tobin with wide eyes. The finding of a new, mineral rich system was unheard of.

"Send pilots aboard our new ships," Tobin ordered Silmari. "I want the cargo ships taken down to the surface. There should be a surface command module on board. Send it down with ten crewmen who are willing to remain on the surface for an extended period of time."

"Remain?" Shindo asked.

"We're establishing a permanent presence on this world," Tobin said. "I wasn't joking, Shindo. The Force tells me that there will soon be tens, even hundreds of thousands of people on this world. Specialist Hastings is a surveyor by trade. Make sure she's part of the crew that goes down, and make sure they have at least five months of supplies. Chances are we'll be back in mere weeks, but I want to make sure they're well stocked. I'll go down with them myself on the first run."

Silmari quickly relayed the orders to Shandor, who made it happen with casual efficiency. The ship did indeed have a surface command module that was capable of independent flight. While crew entered the five stolen cargo ships, Shandor himself personally piloted the module while Tobin took one of the ten Interceptors on board to escort the ships down. One of the _Destiny's_ two shuttles followed.

The planet was comprised of three large continents which featured a variety of environments ranging from cold tundra to dry desert, but was primarily made up of grasslands. Tobin selected a grassy field on a plateau near a large continental river plain, just a few klicks from the base of a mountain range, to sit down.

He hopped down the from the TIE-_Interceptor_ cockpit he flew and into the knee-high grasses. A gentle wind played with the locks of his hair as he stood there, eyes-closed. The feel of the planet was clean and fresh and unsullied. The sudden desire to share this with Klinti was so strong a tear rose in his eyes.

The moment passed though when the air above him cracked before the cargo ships falling under the speed of sound. He walked away from the fighter, conscious of the life under his feet. Small insects and serpentine creatures recognized he was not a part of their world and skittered or slithered away from his feet. Behind him, the cargo ships were settling down and the shuttle was on fast approach, but Tobin ignored it all as he continued walking toward the edge of the plateau.

He reached the edge of the cliff. It appeared to be an old volcanic up thrust of some kind. The cliff was comprised of aging basalt in a sheer drop of several hundred meters. The valley below shimmered in the afternoon sun. He saw two broad rivers heading toward the mid-continental sea, while the grassy savannah between them seemed to produce waves under the wind. He could see animals moving about in the grass—some quite large. It didn't surprise him that the world had mega fauna. The atmosphere was oxygen rich and made him feel better just for breathing it.

A part of him felt sad that the virgin quality of the world was about to be lost. But he also knew this planet was a gift to him and those who would follow him.

The cargo ships set down right behind his tri-panel fighter. The module landed moments later.

As soon as the black cube came to rest, it began to unfold. The sides fell down into the grassy soil and then pushed up, automatically leveling the large craft. Four spikes shot down into the ground until they reached rock, again automatically keeping the structure level. The top split open as a communications array rose up. The softer walls within the outer shell began to push out until what was left was a two-level structure large enough to comfortably barrack fifty troopers and a command staff.

Shandor had assured Tobin the module was properly stocked with food and emergency medical supplies and a water vaporator to keep the tanks full.

The shuttle brought up the very rear. The crews of the now powered-down cargo ships started to load onto the shuttle, while the selected staff of the module made their way across the plains. At their lead was Specialist Hastings.

Hastings was a human woman in her mid-forties. She was heavy-set without being fat, and had a wildly oversized bosom that had been a subject of many jokes on board. She was good natured about the subject. Tobin knew from Shandor that she was a mother of five, and that none of her children were alive. Every single one had been Force-sensitive and thus were all euthanized.

After the fifth child, she had herself sterilized, left her husband, and went to the Rings, leaving the Empire behind her. She found the Unitarian sect shortly after and had been active with it ever since.

"Captain," she said with a nod. "The commander said I was to do survey work?"

Tobin nodded. "I don't know when or how many, but eventually there will be cities on this planet. I'd like you to survey the continent for possible sites. The module has an atmospheric jitney, make full use of it. Also take soil samples and samples of fauna and flora to determine if it's edible. I would like the impact on the planet to be as minimal as possible."

Hasting's eyes took on a distant gaze. "I'm going to survey a virgin world?"

"The second city of the planet will be named Hastings," Tobin assured her. "The first will be named Haven for now."

Hastings nodded without a formal response and went back to fetch her equipment. Her eyes drifted away from Tobin and locked onto the valley below even as she walked. Tobin looked at the rest. "Your job is to help her, keep her safe, and keep your eyes out on that cargo. It's probably going to be an easy, boring assignment, but make sure you are armed at all times. Like any new world, some of the native life forms could be dangerous. I've also seen this world as megafauna, so that means mega predators. It may not be a bad idea to set up perimeter alarms and shields. The module has a medical droid. If you experience a true emergency, contact the ship. We won't abandon you unless the whole ship is in danger."

The men and women nodded—part of being pirates was long periods of inactivity. Tobin liked the people Shandor picked. They were an even mix of male and female, humanoid all, and felt through the Force like Unitarians. Their body language around each other indicated they were friendly with each other. That friendship and shared experience would be necessary to see them through the isolation of their assignment.

"We'll be back," Tobin assured them before he walked back to his fighter and Shandor joined the rest on the shuttle and returned to the _Destiny._ The shuttle lifted off first—Tobin remained by the fighter for a time, just feeling the fresh air on his face. Then he too turned, climbed into the cockpit, and moments later was heading back into space.

~~Last Jedi~~

They were back within three weeks with two large cargo ships in their holds and one almost as large as the _Destiny_ in tow. Once again, the Dueternium-82 trick worked like a charm.

They stripped the cargo ships of every credit and item of value they could fit into the _Destiny's_ holds with the knowledge that they would soon be returning to the Rings to sell their merchandise. The rest they kept with their stolen cargo ships and parked them on the surface of Sestia III. This made seven cargo ships ranging from fifty to four hundred meters in size.

When their booty was taken care of, Tobin began planning their next move. He suspected they had one more shot using the transparisteel trick before the Empire got wise and put out a general alert.

He intended to make the most of it, but not with mere cargo ships. He already had cause to recruit more men—it was not getting close to begin the next phase of his plan. To do that, Tobin retreated to his quarters and used the former captain's security codes to hack into the Naval relays.

The Imperial Navy was the epitome of organization with the route of every ship in the Navy plotted out. Deviations from flight paths were all carefully noted along with the reasons for those deviations. Tobin only had a few more days with those codes before they were all automatically re-scrambled to prevent exactly what Tobin was doing. Still, it was enough.

He found his target and smiled. He tapped the ship intercom. "Silmari, I have new coordinates."

Three days later, Tobin stood on the bridge when the two dovin basils he had at the very prow of the ship activated and created an interdiction field. Just moments later an Imperial corvette escorted by two heavy TIE Raiders dropped out of hyperspace. The corvette was only two hundred meters and looked like a naked frigate. While its prow was wedge-shaped much like the standard frigate design, the main body was cylindrical with protrusions for missile and torpedo launchers, and the communications and shielding array. The back of the ship flared out again for the massive thruster and hyperdrive block.

"What is the meaning of this!" the captain of the Corvette shouted over the Imperial holonet frequency almost immediately.

Tobin had the crew manifest memorized. "Captain Tision? My name is Captain Artin of the _Destiny_. I apologize for the inconvenience, but Moff Hershied received some intelligence that indicates your ship made be in danger."

Captain Tision was a Chiss-human hybrid with near human-norm skin with just the hint of a blue tint, but with truly Chiss-red eyes. "I am unfamiliar with your ship, Captain, and I make a point of knowing all ships in the fleet. How did you know my name?"

Tobin delved into the man's thoughts without mercy. "Captain, I am sending you a command override code. It is essential that you abandon ship immediately on Moff Hershied's orders." As he spoke he leaned over Soonta's personal command station and quickly typed the override code in. It was a code only Tision knew, until Tobin plucked it from his brain.

Tobin could tell the moment Tision saw the code over the holonet. "I see," the older captain said quickly. "What is the nature of the emergency?"

"We believe explosives were placed on your ship during last month's refit. In fact, yours is just one of a dozen ships so affected. We've already lost a frigate and we refuse to loose any more."

The captain's eyes widened. "I dare say so," he muttered. "Very well, captain. We only have fifty crew. Do you have room for our men and our raiders?"

Tobin nodded. "Absolutely. I will meet you in the landing bay personally with refreshments for you and your crew."

The corvette carried a single shuttle. It launched within minutes of the conversation. Tobin reached the bay at the same time as Shandor did with his squad of fifty raiders who just happened to be wearing trooper armor. With his new command access, Shandor was able to key the armor to his people.

"Stand at attention," Shandor shouted at them. "Remember, until the pilots are out of those heavy raiders and the whole crew is over, you are crack Imperial troopers."

The shuttle floated into the main cargo bay, which happened to take up a sizable portion of the frigate. Behind it came the two heavy raiders. Like the modern version of the TIE fighters, the raiders had three solar panels arranged in a triangular shape around a central cylindrical body bristling with weaponry and ending in a flair to support their hyperdrive units.

The bottom pair of panels folded up and the two heavy fighter/bombers came to a rest on the deck. Between them the shuttle ramp lowered below the nose of the craft and Captain Tision stepped out.

Tobin stepped forward to the captain and snapped off a sharp salute, exactly as Shandor had shown him. "Captain Tision, welcome aboard. I apologize for the inconvenience. Once your ship is evacuated I have a scan team ready to examine your ship. You and your officers may if you wish accompany them. Hopefully our intelligence is wrong in your case and I'll have you back aboard in an hour. In the meantime, would you and your men care for any refreshments?"

"That would be appreciated," Tision said. Meanwhile, the shuttle ramp closed after the first half of the corvette's crew unloaded. Tobin showed the captain to a table heaping with food and drink even while Soonta sent a small crew of people into the hangar with folding seats and tables.

"Are they changing the uniforms?" Tision said as he noted Tobin and Shandor's slacks.

"A beta design," Tobin said with a casual shrug. "I'm not sure I care for it, but I felt it appropriate to volunteer when a notice went out. I understand it was only sent to a few ships on a trial basis."

"Indeed," Tision said. "You are young, Captain. I can see where being quick to volunteer would get you where you are."

"Indeed, the curse of my youthful face," Tobin forced a smile. "Were I eighty, I believe my dear Pa would still call me his Baby Boy."

Tision laughed even as his eyes scanned the bay. Beyond them, the two-man crews of the heavy raiders were leaving their ships and walking toward the door table. Shandor's men remained standing at attention along the walls.

"So, tell me Captain Artin, where is this ship stationed out of?"

The shuttle was returning. Tobin could see it coming in for its landing through the atmospheric shields. "We're out of Sestia," he said honestly.

The shuttle came to a halt and the ramp opened. Crewmen started to disembark.

"I'm not sure I'm familiar with that world," Tision said with one arched brow. "Is it near Bastion?"

Tobin's com beeped. "I'm sorry, Captain, can you excuse me a moment?"

Tision nodded, his brow still raised. Tobin could sense suspicion in the man's mind as he stepped away. "Soonta?" he said into the com.

"The corvette is empty, Captain," came the voice of the Twi'lek officer.

"Very good. Give Shandor and his people the message."

Tobin looked back at the captain. "My apologies, sir. Now, you were saying?"

"I was saying that the Empire does not maintain a navel station at any place named Sestia, and to my knowledge, there is no Imperial frigate named _Destiny_. I do know, however, of the HIMS _Redoubt_ that was lost nearly four weeks ago to a pirate raid. You wouldn't happen to know anything about that, would you, Captain?"

At that moment, both doors opened and another hundred men, in mixed trooper and marine armor, came pouring in. Those troopers under Shandor already in the room fell to their knees with their weapons drawn while the corvette crew stared in shock.

Tobin smiled at the captain. "I might know something about it."

The captain sputtered. "You dare," he finally hissed. "The arrogance. The stupidity! Do you honestly think we would just hand over an Imperial corvette? That ship is locked under codes you can never release, and I will die before I give them to you."

"You'll die as you give them to me, to be sure," Tobin said. "Order your men to lay down their weapons and surrender, and I promise that I will allow you all to board your shuttle in safety. All I want is the corvette and your raiders."

"I'll die first!" the captain declared.

The rest of the captain's crew seemed to understand fairly quickly what was happening. They pulled their sidearms—those who had them—and Tobin's crew responded without hesitation. It turned into a slaughter. The captain tried to use his own weapon against Tobin only to have it wrenched painfully away. When he tried to run, Tobin caught the man in the Force and pulled him back. "Oh no, Captain, you can't run, and I won't let you die, not until I've ripped those codes from your mind."

Tobin had to deflect several stray blaster bolts with his sabers, much to the continuing shock of Captain Tision, but in the end a crew of fifty with four pilots could not withstand an attack force of two hundred.

Tobin noted, however, that he had lost a good twenty of his people. Tision's men fought well. When the fight was over, the captain stood head bowed, his fists clenched at his sides. "You'll pay for this, you bastard," he hissed.

"Perhaps," Tobin said. "I wish you had surrendered, captain. I didn't want this bloodshed. The whole point of my ruse was to try and save your lives. But it's too late now."

With that, Tobin snatched a hand out to the captain's head. Shandor and all his people stood up and looked away from the carnage of the battle to see the captain arch his back and scream in agony. The pain lasted only moments before he fell boneless to the plates of the floor.

Tobin remained standing, his eyes closed. "Lieutenant Commander Shandor," he called, still with closed eyes, "have a boarding crew ready to take the corvette. I have the command codes."

"Yes, Captain," the commander said. Then, looking back at his men, he said, "Just goes to show—don't make the Force-blessed angry."


	19. The Seeds of the Future

**Chapter Nineteen: The Seeds of the Future **

They landed the corvette on Sestia III the next day but did not actually remove any of its supplies. The ship had truly just been refitted and so was fully stocked for a six month cruise around its assigned sector. Tobin had plans for that corvette.

Once they had the corvette situated and the _Destiny's_ cargo bay full, it was time to return to the Rings.

~~Last Jedi~~

Tobin, Kenth Shandor and Silmari sat in the new captain's quarters drinking and planning for the future. Or more precisely, Tobin was mentioning what he wanted and Kenth and Silmari were discussing possible avenues to achieve those desires. They were only a few hours from the Rings.

"We have enough ships that at this point you could conceivably start shipping legitimately," Shandor noted. "Five cargo ships have a great deal of carrying capacity."

"We probably will go legitimate at least in part," Tobin said. "We'll need a steady stream of income."

"You have twenty million in merchandise just on this ship," Silmari noted.

"It's a start."

The two blinked at Tobin, but he said nothing for the moment. Instead, he closed his eyes and went perfectly still. To those who had not spent any time around him, it might seem as if he were sleeping. However, Kenth and Silmari knew better.

"We need a barrister," Tobin finally said. "A licensed, accredited barrister. One well versed in the Imperial Code. Possibly even a firm."

"No better lawyers than on Chandrila," Kenth said. "Nothing fosters vicious barristers than a pacifist society. It's the only combat available to them."

Tobin smiled without feeling. "Do you know of any firms that do business with the underworld?"

"Several," Kenth said. "Pirates have made the leap to legitimate business before. In fact it happens more than you might think."

"We'll need more ships," Tobin said. "That means a new shipping list to find them. I want to cultivate a better contact in the Shipping Authority. Someone loyal to more than just money."

Kenth nodded. "I suspected you might when you had Shindo call me. Before I left I asked Afton Shrief to try and get a Sect member into the office. You may not know this, but aside from being a successful business man on his world, Shrief was also a consummate politician. I received notice just a few weeks ago that he actually has three people in the Authority who are devout Unitarians."

Tobin's smile morphed into a grin. "That's good."

They arrived at the Rings on time and almost immediately Silmari and Tobin began contacting brokers while Kenth went to pay a visit to the Unitarians. They did eventually off-load their booty, but the price wasn't quite what Tobin wanted. Still, it was more than enough to keep his crew paid for the remainder of the year. Overhead was low since he simply stole what they needed most.

After most of their business was completed, Tobin ordered shore-leave in thirds for the crew and went to the Node. There he simply walked up and down the black sandy beaches listening to kids laugh and play, until the lights dimmed into the night cycle. When that occurred he walked in the dark, until at some point he laid down in the sand, closed his eyes, and drifted into an uneasy sleep, waiting for something that he could not yet name.

He woke to the feel of a pair of small hands attempting to lift his purse. He caught the wrist in an iron grip and heard a terrified gasp. When he opened his eyes, he found himself staring into the face of a boy of perhaps seven. Human, mostly. He had tousled blond hair and brown eyes set above high cheekbones.

The boy virtually glowed with the Force.

"Please don't hurt me," the boy whimpered. He was scrawny and had a sheen of hunger about him.

"Where are your parents?"

"They're real close," the boy lied. "If I scream they'll come."

"No, they won't. What's your name?"

"Aaris."

Tobin knew that if he let go, the boy would bolt. Though the child was starved, he was also desperate, and Force-strong enough to make a good escape attempt.

"Tell me, Aaris, would you like a place to stay where you ate every day?"

The boy's face wrinkled. "I don't do things like that you perv."

Tobin did not laugh, because it wasn't funny. What the boy alluded to was all too common in the near anarchy of the Rings. "I'm talking about a berth on board a ship. With a teacher to teach you, and food every day. You'd have to do some work as a cabin boy, but you'd not go hungry again."

"Why would you do that?"

Tobin let go of the wrist, but before the boy could run, he levitated the child off the sand. The boy whimpered. "I have the Force," Tobin said as he stood. With the boy floating in the air, their eyes were even. "And I sense that the Force is with you as well. With time and training, you could do this as well. If you join me, Aaris, I will train you in the Force."

The boy's eyes widened. "And you'd give me food?"

"As much as you can eat."

"You're not going to bugger and then kill me, are you?"

"Never."

Tobin set the boy down. He watched as the boy tensed on the verge of exploding into flight. Emotions played across his face. "Heard tell Abnormals were bad," the boy said. "Mum sent me 'way when the troopers came for me."

"Troopers came for me too, when I was younger," Tobin said. "My mother saved me. But she couldn't save herself."

"You 'lone too, then?"

"Not any more, not if you come."

The boy nodded hesitantly. Tobin knew better than to reach for him. Instead, he simply walked toward the end of the beach and the slide walk that would take them to the rail out of the node. The boy followed along a step behind.

The boy's eyes widened when they reached the bay where the _Destiny_ was currently berthed. "That ship is where you serve? Who's your captain?"

"I'm the captain. My name is Tobin S'Artin. And you are going to be the cabin boy, and my apprentice."

"Wow," the boy said. He peered up side-ways at Tobin. "And you're really going to feed me, but not kill me?"

"I'll feed you, and I promise I won't kill you."

With that, Tobin led his new charge onto the ship. With a third of the crew gone and the ship on nightcycle, they only passed by the ten guards on duty along the airlocks before they were walking the halls of the ship.

Tobin led the boy to one of the officer's quarters and activated the notice tone. A moment later, Shindo Bard opened the door wearing only a shirt robe. "Captain!" he said, obviously trying to wipe away sleep. "What can I do for you?"

"I need to talk to you and Soola," Tobin said. He smirked. "I'll give you a few minutes to be presentable. Then please come to my quarters."

"Yes, sir!" Shindo said with a blush.

As Tobin and the boy walked away, the boy wrinkled his nose. "He smelled like girl bits."

"He did indeed," Tobin said with a laugh.

A few minutes later, Soola Dayaala and Shindo reported to Tobin's cabin. Inside they found a boy sitting at the edge of the captain's desk devouring a ground-nerf sandwich and crisps.

"You wanted to see us, Captain?" Shindo asked.

Tobin nodded and the two sat down. "Shindo, Soola, this is Aaris. He is going to be the ship's cabin boy. And my apprentice."

Two adult sets of eyes widened in surprise. "You mean he's Force blessed?"

"He is," Tobin said. "He has a midi-chlorian count of sixteen thousand—that would have been respectable even to the Jedi Council of old. As you can see, he has not had an easy life. He has been on his own since he was five years old. He has been abused and starved. Before I can truly begin his Force training, he needs a semblance of normality. He needs a steady environment and some teaching."

As he spoke, he was looking steadily at the blue-skinned Twi'lek who helped save his life on Nalderaan. The former teacher was staring at the boy with an open expression of motherly concern. "I would like the two of you to consider taking him in," Tobin finished.

"Our quarters are…." Shindo began.

"You'll have the old captain's quarters while on the ship," Tobin said. "If you wish to cohabitate, that is. I know you've tried to be discreet about your relationship, but Aaris's well being is more important to me than your restraint. It's likely the boy's condition will make imprint learning difficult, so he'll need a full time teacher, a full time mother, and a full time friend."

Soola pulled her eyes from the boy's face. "He reminds me of you on that day they came," she whispered.

"I know. That's why I thought of you."

Shindo put a hand on Soola's shoulder. "Would we…would we have your blessing?"

Tobin tried to hide his surprise, but it was difficult. Suddenly he shifted from being their captain to being their religious leader and it frightened him a little. Slowly, he stood and stepped around the desk until he was between then. He took Soola's hand in his right, and Shindo's in his left, and sank himself into the Force. He saw glimpses of violence against them, but never between then. As far as he could see—in all the possibilities he could detect—he never saw either of them intentionally harming the other.

"The Force blesses your union," he finally said. "You will not have any children of your own, but you will both play important roles in the lives of many other children. You especially, Soola."

All this time, Aaris sat staring at Tobin with a gaping mouth. "What are you talking about?"  
he finally asked.

"Aaris," Tobin said, "this is Soola. When I was ten years old, she helped save my mother and I. And this is her husband…" Soola and Shindo shared a surprised look. "…Shindo. Shindo has two children, but they are grown, and Soola was a teacher for many years. And if you are willing to give it a try, and if they are willing, it is my hope that you will live with them while I train you. I'm going to have to go many places, and I won't always be able to give you the home you need."

The boy stared from one to the other. "She don't look like me Ma."

"No, I would suppose I don't," Soola said.

"You're pretty, though."

"Thank you. My…my husband and I would very much like you to come stay with us. You'll have your own room and your own bed. We'll make sure you have good food every day with new clothes. I'll teach you how to read and write like grown-ups do. Do you think you would like that?"

"Do you hit?" the boy asked. The question brought a tear to Soola's eyes because of the flat, experienced tone in it.

"I will never hit you," she vowed.

"Okay," Aaris said. Then he continued eating his sandwich.

"Thank you both," Tobin said.

"Were you serious when you…" Shindo started.

"I'll put it in the ship's log. If you want to have a ceremony in the sect Temple, I'm sure everyone would be happy to attend. But as far as the Force and I are concerned, you are a married couple."

Two days later, Shindo and Soola celebrated their marriage in the Sect Temple. Aaris sat on the first row sleeping. He tried to stay awake, but five years of abuse and hunger had taken their toll and he slept a great deal at first. Still, Mina in the medical bay assured Tobin the boy would recover with the appropriate dietary supplements.

The day after the ceremony, Tobin contacted the Rings office of Shuung, Daysil and Macan, a Barrister firm with offices on Corusca, Chandrila and the Corporate Sector. The Barrister he spoke to was a young human woman with short-cropped black hair and purple eyes set above skin the color of freshly brewed caf.

"Captain S'Artin," she said when Tobin stepped into her office and past the appreciative secretary. "Please have a seat. My name is Amarooni Andal."

Tobin sat and eyed the woman carefully. She did not have the ceremonial tattoos, but she very much looked like a Mirialan. When he mentioned it, she pursed her lips. "The Empire frowns on tribal customs," she said.

"And so you forewent the customary body art to better fit in," Tobin said. "I understand the Mirialans attain their tattoos quite young."

"I was determined," she said.

"Good. Do you know who I am?"

"You're the Abnormal who took an Imperial Frigate single-handedly," she said. "The local moff has a million credit bounty on your head. I'm amazed you don't have an army of bounty hunters after you."

"I might at that," he admitted. "I am looking to put a firm on permanent retainer. I wish to pursue some shipping interests in the legitimate business world. I would need letters of charter and incorporation, as well as the appropriate licenses for my ships."

"What you propose is possible but costly," Andal said. "You would need to have a legitimate office either on Corusca or one of the other Core Worlds.'

"Would anyone need to be there?"

"No. In fact, I know of some offices staffed solely with a droid that scans and forwards any physical mailings and handles any calls."

"Can your firm establish such an office?"

"Of course."

Tobin leaned forward and stared hard at Andal, who stared back with a well-practiced poker face. Even so, he could sense the thoughts twirling in her mind. "I wish to keep my business compartmentalized," he said. "You and you only. Share only what information you must to accomplish my needs. Prepare papers for the Sestia Shipping Line. Establish the necessary office on Corusca. Although we should have a droid at first, make sure the office is large enough that a staff of beings can use it as well. Perhaps an apartment attached. I'm sure I or my people will have need of it at one point or another."

"Licenses and registrations?"

"I'll get descriptions of the ships I currently possess, with more to come."

Though Andal made no move to make notes, he knew his every word was being recorded. "Shall coordinates be provided for this 'Sestia'?"

"No."

She nodded without changing her stony expression. "What else?"

"The framework necessary to charter a bank," he said. "Perhaps some practical instruction."

"You're going into banking, Mr. S'Artin?"

"No personally, but I anticipate that Sestia will need a bank soon. It's a world with a future."

"Very well, I can have material sent to your berth today. The rest will take longer. Please leave a holonet frequency at the front desk, and I'll contact you as soon as everything is prepared.

"Thank you," Tobin said as he stood. He walked out of the barrister's office with a grim smile. He felt eyes watching him and knew that there were bounty hunters out there hunting for him, but he also knew they weren't ready to challenge him just yet.


	20. A Brave New World

**Author's Note: ** Review Responses and comments are now available in the Last Jedi forum in my ff.n forums. Thank you all for reading and reviewing!

* * *

**Chapter Twenty: A Brave New World**

The Shipping Authority clerk was obviously nervous. When Tobin and Afton Shrief met the young Baroli woman, Tobin first assumed the nervousness was simply her fear of getting caught selling information. He soon leaned it was much more serious.

"Ulicia has started sending out colony ships," the young woman began almost as soon as they were seated in the non-descript topcaf located on the lower rung of the first Ring in a corner. It was still early, so the bar was relatively empty.

Shrief, a former administrator from Ulicia, nodded with equal concern. "The devastation from the attacks had a dramatic affect on the planet's atmosphere. The global mean temperature has already dropped three degrees. Our computer models predict the planet will descend into a prolonged period of increased ice-sheet cover without Imperial aid, and we know that's not coming. We were looking at a near forty percent decrease in our food production."

"That's not the problem, though!" the clerk said. She looked around after she realized her voice was too loud. "I found out that the shift leader here was specifically directed to sell the ships' hyperspace routes and schedules. They've been marked by the Empire for termination!"

Tobin felt a stab of cold in his gut. "When are they scheduled to depart?"

"Within days. Three ships, all launching at the same time. One is heading for Nalderaan, the other two for the Rim. Fifty thousand people on each ship. They're going to be slaughtered!"

Tobin looked at Shrief. "Do you still have contacts on Ulicia?'

"I do."

"Call them. If they deviate from their courses, the Empire will find some other means of harassing them or killing them outright. Instead, make sure all their necessary supplies are on one ship. I don't care if people have to be sleeping on each other's laps."

"And the other two ships?"

"You misunderstand," Tobin said. "I want all one hundred and fifty thousand people on one ship with their supplies."

"They won't fit," the clerk said. "The ships aren't that big."

"We'll find a way," Shrief said.

"They need to stay on one ship at least past the launch," Tobin said. "As soon as they enter hyperspace, we'll meet them at their first hyperspace drop-off point rendezvous coordinates to offload their people onto our cargo ships and the _Destiny_. The other two ships should be piloted by droids only and rigged to explode if any one takes a shot at their engines."

"I'll need to make the call soon," Shrief said. "Where will they all go?"

"Sestia, of course," Tobin smiled. "And Afton, when this is done, we need to seriously consider moving the rest of the Sect as well. We'll need to maintain a presence here, but soon it will not be safe."

Shrief gave a firm nod before he took the clerk by the hand and led her out of the room. Tobin remained a moment, mulling over a glass of carbonated sweet water. Things were moving even faster than he originally anticipated.

He tapped his wrist com. "_Destiny_, this is the Captain. Is Krenth on board?"

"Here, Captain," came Shandor's calm voice.

"We need to crew the corvette. Start vetting our stand-bys. "

"How soon?"

"We need to be moving today. A hundred and fifty thousand lives depend on this. This is our top priority."

"Understood, Captain. I'm on it."

Fortunately, they had enough standbys from the crewing of the _Destiny_ to quickly crew the much smaller corvette that Tobin decided to name the _Ulicia_. It was, after all, going to be helping save quite a few Baroli from that planet.

He finished his drink and was about to leave when he felt a warning surge through the Force. Deeply honed instincts took over and he launched himself from his corner just as a missile struck. Tobin spun in the air and pushed against the ball of flame even as he fell to the floor on his back.

The concussive power of the explosion ripped through the walls and bar. Tobin briefly heard the human caf tender scream in pain before being ripped apart. The bulk of his concentration, though, was on holding death at bay.

Finally the explosion fizzled away. Tobin picked himself up, sabers in hand, and saw a Mando standing just outside the room.

"Nice," came the wry comment from the bounty hunter. "Been a long time since our kind have met, Jedi."

"I'm no Jedi," Tobin said. "Jedi play nice." He sank himself completely into the Force and launched himself forward.

The Mando obviously had cybernetic upgrades since he was able to spin out of the way, even if just barely. Tobin emerged onto the open promenade with both sabers out.

"This is going to be fun," the Mando said, again with that dry quality to his voice.

"Not really," Tobin assured him.

The Mando brought up a pair of blaster gauntlets similar to those used by troopers and unleashed not a blaster, but a sonic disruption blast that was impossible to deflect with a lightsaber.

Tobin did not even try. He launched himself into the air and threw his saber at the same time. His body somersaulted over the bounty hunter while his red saber seared through the air like a javelin. The Mando had no choice but to roll away.

Tobin gave him no time to regroup. Faster than the human eye could follow he launched himself forward and then unleashed the full fury of the Force in the form of blue lightning. The Mando screamed in pain, though the scream was abruptly cut off as Tobin Force-gripped him and tossed the man into the air.

He knew Mandos had jets built into their armor, but it required human control to activate. Stunned as he was from the blast of Force lightning, the Mando had difficulty thinking to activate his jets. Tobin summoned his second saber and let the Mando fall.

Stunned or not, the man still had the presence to unleash a gout of flame in an attempt to clear Tobin away. It did not work. The young Force-adept used his power to push the flame back into the face of its caster. The Mando managed one last scream before his fall took him within reach of Tobin's lightsabers.

When the armor hit the floor, it did so in five separate sections, with charred body parts still contained within each.

Tobin deactivated his blades and made a show of looking around. Crowds had gathered, but at a safe distance. The only ones who dared approach were the Security forces. Even they approached slowly.

Tobin impatiently waved them over. "Do you doubt who started this fight?" he asked the first to arrive.

The Gran shook his head. "No, we caught it on security footage. This one was Oldan Friest, one of the best bounty hunters in the galaxy. He has never lost a mark."

"He has today," Tobin said. "Do you need me?"

"No, Captain, you are free to go."

Left unsaid was the fact that no one there could have stopped him. However, Tobin knew it was to his advantage to play the part of the cooperative victim. "Thank you. If you need me, Docking Authority has my contact information." He nodded to the security agents and started walking toward his ship.

It was a mark of Shandor's prestige and ability that by the time Tobin returned to his ship, fifty crewmen for the _Ulicia_ had already been gathered. Most were vetted from the crewing of the _Destiny_, but Tobin also noticed several more Baroli from Shrief's people. Shandor stood beside the two lines of crewmen who waited for Tobin as he boarded.

When they saluted, Tobin smiled and returned the gesture. "You're fast, Kenth."

"Yes, sir."

Tobin scanned their Force signatures briefly, looking for spies or enemies. He found none—though Kenth did not have the Force, he was still an excellent judge of character. "Very good," he said. "Kenth, consider yourself a full commander now. When we arrive at Sestia you'll take command of the _Ulicia_."

Shandor allowed one brow to rise.

"We'll also be crewing all cargo ships. We'll need their holds emptied onto the planet."

Shandor studied the captain for the longest time. "Last month you told the survey to start planning cities, and now we're saving a colony ship?"

The other crewmen broke etiquette and stared at the captain in a mixture of confusion, and for the Baroli, awe.

"The Force provides for those who are prepared to receive," Tobin said. "This is the beginning, Kenth. Just the beginning."

**~~The Last Jedi~~**

The Zabrak made a grunt of satisfaction when the colony ship dropped out of hyperspace exactly where and when the shipping manifest said it would. Like most colony ships, this one was essentially a pair of flying wheels rotating in opposite directions and supported by a central fuselage. It was larger than the Ship, as the Zabrak thought of his star destroyer, but only just. It was a civilization with thrusters, and when fully stocked was capable of creating a whole self-sustained city within the year.

"It's refusing our hails," Aleusa noted as she stepped onto the command deck to look through the visors at the ship.

"That just makes it fun," Zabrak said with a shrug. "Fire control, take out that thing's engines."

One of the main turbolaser cannons that graced the Ship lined up and fired. They watched as the green bolt crossed the ten thousand meters between the two ships and slammed into the thruster block of the colony ship. They saw a few sparks of light and then suddenly, inexplicably, the whole ship exploded.

"What!" Zabrak raged. "What the blazes happened? Who fired that shot?"

If he had not been so enraged, Zabrak could have ordered the bridge crew to do a basic scan, which would have told them that the colony ship was completely empty. However, he was simply too upset. Instead, he turned to the navigation command pit and said, "Set a new course! Get us to that second ship's tertiary drop-off point!"

Fortunately for the Zabrak they attacked the Nalderaan-bound ship soon after it left, so it gave them the chance to overtake the second colony ship heading toward the Rim. They beat the colony drop-off point by mere minutes, and soon after they decanted from hyperspace the colony ship followed. It was identical to the first.

"They're also refusing our hails," Aleusa noted.

"Don't fire on the fuselage this time!" the Zabrak raged. "Take out the bridge."

Once again a single blaster-bolt speared through the space separating the two ships and slammed through the basic ray and particle shields that all ships had to have to travel through hyperspace. The bolt ripped through the front of the ship's fuselage with devastating effect.

Instead of stopping, the whole ship suddenly veered toward the star destroyer.

"They've increased their velocity," navigation reported nervously. "They're going to ram us."

The Zabrak growled in rage. "Destroy it," he said.

The whole star destroyer opened up and unleashed a hail of green death. The unshielded colony ship did not even get within five thousand meters before it vaporized completely. He and Aleusa shared a long look—they knew the third ship from Ulicia had two other sets of pirates attacking it, so they had essentially lost their chance.

**~~The Last Jedi~~**

Captain Sleeti gave a satisfied growl. The colony ship's defenses were gone—their small handful of archaic TIE-_Predators_ were no match for the pirate captain's squadron of Uglies.

It was an open secret that colony ships were the best targets the pirates could hope for. They almost always contained elements unwanted on their originating planets, and the Empire made it known that it would always look the other way.

Yet the people still sold everything they had to buy a birth on ships that had only a one in five chance of ever making it to their destination. For the fifty thousand souls on this particular ship, they were one of the other eighty percent. In fact, they were specifically targeted. It was rare for Shipping Control to actually solicit bids for a target.

Sleeti gave the order to start boarding operations. He gave his men permission to grab anyone that caught their eye for fun later, since everyone else would be destroyed when he blasted the ship.

Suddenly the alarm claxon in the old Alliance corvette went off. "What?" he demanded.

"Imperial Frigate off the port bow," Sleeti's second shouted. "It's launching fighters! It's signaled for our surrender."

This was not right. The Imperials weren't supposed to care about colonists. "I won't surrender. Ask them what they want?"

The frigate's forward turbolaser batteries opened fire. Sleeti fell to the floor decking as two of his own turbolaser batteries were destroyed. "Signal again," the second officer said. "They say surrender or be destroyed."

"What about _Ugly Maiden_?" Sleeti asked of their fellow pirate ship.

"An Imperial corvette has attacked them," the second said. "They're under fire."

Outside the main transparisteel window of the ship he could see his Uglies being obliterated by the newer Imperial fighters. "Get us out of here!" Sleeti commanded.

"We're being held by an interdiction field!" the second yelled.

"Then turn and prepare to fire!" Sleeti yelled.

The moment he spoke, a high-yield proton-torpedo ripped through the reinforced hull directly over the bridge of the corvette. Sleeti died screaming in fire with the rest of the bridge crew. As soon as the ship began to drift out of control, escape pods jettisoned.

The frigate fired on and destroyed all the pirate pods. A few thousand klicks away, the corvette made short work of the modified freighter that served as the second pirate ship. Even before the last shots were fired, five cargo ships dropped out of hyperspace.

On board the colony ship, the elected leader of the colony families, Sula Santari, watched the exchange with relief mixed with grief over the loss of her fighters.

She answered the signal from the frigate. "Imperial Ship, we give you our thanks."

The captain who answered was not in an Imperial uniform. Nor did he look old enough to be a captain. "I accept your thanks, Madam Santari, but we are not Imperials. We're pirates ourselves. May I assume you spoke to Mr. Shrief?"

Sula sighed with overwhelming relief. "You're the Force-blessed? Tobin S'Artin?"

"I am. I've already confirmed from my sources that the other two ships have been destroyed. We need to get your people and supplies off your ship and destroy it, or the Empire will not let the remaining survivors on Ulicia go. All personnel will come aboard the _Destiny_ and the _Ulicia_. Supplies will go aboard the cargo ship. Things will be very tight so only load what you must to survive."

"Understood," Sula said. She turned to the stunned faces of her crew and the colony leaders. "You heard the man. Let's get this ship unloaded."

The larger of Tobin's five cargo ships docked first and the Baroli colonists started loading their supplies quickly. By the time the other four ships docked they managed to unload all of their essential supplies, most of their luxury supplies, and easily five thousand people.

The rest were much harder. The corvette was only able to hold a few hundred and even then people were forced to stand in the halls. They filled the corvette's shuttle as well. Then the _Destiny_ docked.

The frigate's cargo holds had been emptied for this very reason, but even so the ship was bursting at the seams with people, and even then Tobin realized with a sinking feeling that they just didn't have enough room for everyone, even using their shuttles.

It was with a sense of profound relief for Tobin then when a new ship emerged from hyperspace. It was a passenger cruiser, an old battered one, but still flying. "_Destiny_," came the voice of Afton Shrief, "I suspected you might have some space issues. Can I be of assistance?"

"You can indeed," Tobin said with a jubilant smile.

The passenger liner was nothing more than a shell with engines, designed simply to carry people. It managed to fit in an astounding number, as well. All one hundred and fifty thousand people left the huge colony ship.

On Tobin's orders, the small convoy started toward Sestia after a few false-jumps to throw off any pursuers. Tobin ordered the _Destiny_ to remain for an hour. After that, he destroyed the colony ship. "Good," he finally said. "It looks like the two sides destroyed each other. Silmari, take us home."

When the Imperial corvette arrived the next day, it scanned the debris and deduced that in fact the colony ship had fought back against the pirates, resulting in their mutual destruction. Notices were sent to the next-of-kin of those passengers listed on the manifests, and the issue was soon forgotten.

**~~The Last Jedi~~**

They arrived at Sestia two days later breathing stale air and suffering with over-burdened septic systems. The whole ship stank from the press of life on board, but Tobin didn't care. All the frustration and desperation faded from the eyes of the Baroli when they set foot on their new world for the first time.

The _Destiny_ made a rare landing on the planet surface due to the sheer number of people on board. Already, Tobin saw that the cargo ships were unloading the temporary quick-set structures that would house the colonists. A large construction droid was already installing plumbing and power lines pre-marked by the surveyor, Hastings. The droid was large enough that it dug out the trench with a central wheeled shovel in the front, storing the soil in a bucket while laying down the pipe, and then dumping the soil behind it and compressing it back in a single pass.

The water treatment plant was a quick-set system and was already awaiting the first pipe.

Sula Santari was aboard the passenger liner and so she and Tobin never had a chance to speak, but upon alighting to the surface Tobin knew he would need to speak to the colony leaders. He was joining the other colonists down the ramp when he heard a high-voice call for him.

"Master!"

Tobin turned to see Aaris weaving through the crowd.

After just a week of good food, the boy looked better already. The shallow complexion was gone, replaced by a healthy sheen. Tobin knew from Soola and Shindo that the boy still suffered occasional nightmares, but was already doing better.

They had only had one brief meeting together where Tobin described the rules the boy was to follow. Other than that, they had not spoken. Until now.

The Baroli, who were almost predominantly Unitarians, stared with some surprise as the boy addressed the Force-Blessed as master. Tobin merely nodded to them and motioned for Aaris to walk beside him.

They stepped onto the short-grass of the plateau that would soon be brimming with the city Haven. "How are you, Aaris?"

"I'm really good," the boy said, nearly bouncing on his feet. His eyes were everywhere, soaking in the beauty of the world. "Is this…is this our new home?"

"For now," Tobin said. "We won't be able to stay here often, but this world is very important to our plans."

"What should I do for now?"

Tobin saw other children running through the mown grass. "I think you should go play with the others," he said. "Just be good."

Aaris's eyes widened. "Do you…I don't know if that's a good idea."

"Consider it a test," Tobin said. "Courage is not the absence of fear, Aaris. It is acknowledging that the fear exists, but holds no power over you. It's okay to be afraid or shy. But don't let that fear keep you from living your life. Go and play. Soola will remain on the ship when you're ready to go back."

The boy nodded and then began walking hesitantly toward the other kids. Tobin in the meantime began looking for Sula Santari.

He found her speaking with Afton Shrief and Kenth Shandor near the edge of the plateau. She, like many, was gazing across the land toward the ocean with moist eyes. She heard him approach and turned abruptly, before she bowed. "I don't know what to say."

Tobin smiled. "Thank you is enough."

"Then thank you, from all of us. You saved our lives."

The Force-adept nodded before joining them along the edge of the plateau. "There is a price, of course."

Beside him, he could feel Santari tense. "Well, of course, anything we can do," she said quickly.

"I've retained a barrister firm," Tobin explained. "I will be incorporating a shipping line so that we have a legitimate business side. This entire colony will be chartered under that corporation. And I am the majority share holder."

"I…" Santari paused. "Force-blessed, for my people I have to ask. What is it you want of us?"

"To live," Tobin said. "To be happy. But for me—I will need a base of operations large enough to eventually sustain a fleet. Sestia is going to be my bread basket in terms of food production. I'll need a population to help man future ships. If I have to refit older ships, a _Pelleaon-_class star destroyer alone required a crew of almost two hundred thousand people."

"Why would you need ships, though? Surely you don't mean to fight the Empire."

"Not fight the Empire. Change it. I'm going to change the Empire as the Force compels me. The days of children being slaughtered is coming to an end. Aaris, my apprentice, is but the first."

"You mean to bring the Jedi back?" Santari asked. She spoke softly, with wide eyes. She was an attractive women in her early forties, with the blue hair and forehead tattoos common to her people.

"Something like that," Tobin said. "It will be a new order of Force adepts that will unify the Force was it was meant to be. There will be no more Dark Side, no more Light Side. There shall be only the gray in between."

He turned back and captured the woman in his gaze. "I sense strength in you, Sula Santari. I sense that you are a good leader to your people. I witnessed your organizational skills in how quickly you unloaded your ship. I could use your skills and leadership. But I also need you to understand that I am the leader. I must be able to make decisions not just for myself and my crew, but for this world and the other ships that will eventually come. By incorporating, though, I am able to put you all on a salary to ensure that you receive compensation for your efforts and protection under Imperial law should my efforts not succeed."

"I'll have to discuss it with the family council," Santari said.

"I'll speak with them as well," Shrief said. "I for one have no issue with this. Captain S'Artin, you have acted selflessly for my people. If in return you need our loyalty, then I give mine freely, and will argue that the others do so as well."

"Good," Tobin said. "Thank you. Now, let's see about getting Haven built, shall we?"


	21. Power Play

**Chapter Twenty-One: Power Play**

There were liners, and then there were luxury liners. The _Star of Ithoria_ was surely one of the most luxurious. As part of the financing to rebuild the world of Ithor lost in the Yuuzhan Vong war, the old Galactic Federation of Free Alliances authorized the Ithorian refugees to charter a star liner firm.

The Ithorian Star Liner corporation proved so successful that the firm funded two Ithorian colonies and hundreds of years later was still considered the premier luxury cruiser line in the galaxy. It cost twenty thousand credits just for a single berth, with prices ranging as high as a hundred thousand credits for some suites.

The liners were considered absolutely safe from piracy because of one simple fact—Moff Hershied and her peers promised the swift destruction of any ship that touched them. After two early attempts in her first year as moff were dealt with brutally and publicly, the pirates accepted the sincerity of Hershied's message and left the liners alone.

It was therefore with a genuine sense of shock that Captain Jawalla heard a mild clang that was an Ithorian alarm going off. He strolled across the wide, spacious bridge to the control station, where the other Ithorian looked up with a puzzled angle to his visual ridge.

"What is the emergency?"

"Two ships have intercepted us," his second said. "They claim to be pirates. Both are Imperial—a frigate and a corvette. Heavily armed. The leader is on line."

The holoscreen resolved to a young human's face. The alien features as always made Jawalla faintly uncomfortable. "What is the meaning of this?" he asked in his native Ithorian. The computer instantly translated for him.

The young man smiled enough to show his white teeth. "I am the captain of the _Destiny._ At this moment we have twenty turbolaser batteries and fifty proton torpedoes aimed at your ship. I am aware of your shielding and weapons capabilities, but I believe this barrage would be more than enough to destroy you."

"What is it you hope to gain?" Jawalla said. "I carry an entire company of Imperial troopers as part of my security force. Any attempt to board would be repelled."

"Any attempt to stop me will end in your deaths," the young man said, no longer smiling. "Open your hangar doors. Do not close them until told other wise. I understand that you cannot command the troopers. I will deal with them personally. But I warn you now—if your ship moves one iota, I will blast you into vapor."

"If I cooperate?"

"Then you and your passengers go free when we have what we want." The human leaned back. "I am not your normal pirate, Captain. I'm not interested in bloodshed. Give me no excuse, and I will do you no harm."

"Very well," the captain said. As soon as the young human's image disappeared Jawalla turned to his second. "Inform the troopers that we have been accosted by pirates. Open the main hangar doors as they request, but do nothing else. I will let the troopers handle this."

A few minutes later, a single Imperial shuttle flew into the hangar bay of the _Star of Ithoria_. Not surprisingly, two hundred Imperial troopers stood in a box-formation around the shuttle with armaments ranging from their powerful blaster gauntlets to anti-ship missiles and shoulder-mounted laser cannons.

They fired on the shuttle the moment it entered the hangar. The shuttle's shields collapsed under the onslaught. The lower left of its three heat foils sheered off and the ship dropped to its left side against the plating of the bay as the troopers continued to fire.

They were oblivious to the figure in the space suit that slipped in through the containment shield of the open bay. The troopers continued firing frantically at the shuttle as the figure stripped off the space suit and hefted his two lightsabers.

Half an hour later, two more shuttles landed in the hangar and disgorged a hundred and fifty of Tobin S'Artin's crew. Tobin waited alone for them. The only sign of the battle in the hangar was carbon-scoring on the floor, and a pile of weapons in a corner that was quickly requisitioned by his crew.

Rather than rush the main levels of the ship, Tobin gathered Shindo and Haslo Bard on one side and the Frarks on the other and strode purposefully to the bridge while Krenth and the rest of his men secured the bay and armory.

Captain Jawalla had sealed the bridge against intrusion.

Tobin removed the seal and the door with two quick swipes of his lightsabers. When the doors slammed inward, he found the Ithorian command crew staring at him with…well, he felt their fear even if he could discern nothing from their odd-shaped heads.

"Captain Jawalla," Tobin said. "I am Captain Tobin S'Artin. Although I cannot say you've been entirely cooperative, you have at least not moved your ship or hindered my boarding actions. For this reason I will allow you and your crew to live. Do not make me reconsider.

The Ithorian second officer, seeing only five pirates compared to a command staff of fifty, reached for a weapon. Tobin reached out a hand and made a fist. The Ithorian gasped and lifted up from his chair. With a jerking motion, Tobin used the Force to throw the Ithorian with bone-crushing power against the far wall.

"An Abnormal," the Captain said, gasping.

"According to my history," Tobin said, "once upon a time the Ithorians revered the Jedi. How times have changed. Please request that all passengers report to the main ball room. State it is a fire drill. Again, cooperation ensures a minimum of bloodshed. In the meantime, you will turn off the power to all secured vaults."

Jawalla nodded, and the announcement was made. Tobin turned to the Bards. "Go through the vaults and gather any credit chips or valuables you can. Get a squad up here to take care of any more heroes. I'll go deal with the passengers."

They split up, and in half an hour Tobin S'Artin stood on the topmost balcony overlooking an interior ballroom that took up a good portion of the center of the ship's uppermost deck. An extravagant transparisteel dome spanned the entire length of the room, revealing the glory of a nearby nebula.

Beside him, Shandor hefted his weapons. "So we're here for jewelry?"

Tobin shook his head as he examined the frightened faces. "No, we're here for it all. The vaults hold the truly valuable items. What they are wearing is not a priority." He sighed. "Ready for the show?"

"Yes, sir," Shandor said with a tight grin. He turned and walked down three flights of stairs until he was on the ground level with the rest of his men.

Tobin stepped onto the balcony railing and waited until all eyes were on him, and then slipping into the Force floated gently down to the lower balcony. "Good afternoon," he said genially. "My name is Tobin S'Artin, captain of the pirate ship _Destiny_. We've seized control of this vessel. Unfortunately I did have to kill the company of troopers assigned here, but that was taken care of quickly."

The crowd mumbled. There were perhaps twelve hundred actual passengers, plus another two thousand crew members.

"So that I don't have to resort to opening fire or blowing the dome over your heads and killing you all instantly by decompression, I am going to call out a list of names. Those of you on this list will step forward. If you do not step forward, I will have my men shoot randomly into the crowd. First name: Hendt Reindel and family."

When Hendt Reindel was not immediately forth-coming, Tobin nodded to Kenth, who passed the word to his men. The pirate soldiers in trooper armor dropped to their knees and took aim into the line of people, much to the startled horror of the crowd. With Force-augmentation, Tobin called out, "There will only be two calls made for each name before we fire. Second call: Hendt Reindel and family."

A tall, aristocratic man stepped forward in formal evening clothes and a host of ribbons on his chest. His wife wore a shimmer-stone around her neck the size of a baby's fist. With them stood a little girl perhaps five or six years of age. Obviously a grandchild. "Over their please, Master Reindel," Tobin pointed.

Kenth waived jovially and the miffed passengers moved to stand beside him.

"Sana Fieliel."

This time the passenger named Fieliel did not hesitate. She was Omwati, with a head full of brightly colored red feathers, but otherwise very human in appearance. She stood beside Reindel.

"Askad Dekarta."

There was no moment. Tobin sighed. "Second call. Askad Dekarta."

The crowd started to fidget. "Lieutenant, open fire," Tobin called.

"Wait!" a desperate cry called out. "I'm coming!"

Dekarta was a true anomaly—a smart, well-spoken Gungan. Only his very large paunch seemed in character for his race. He strolled in his gangly Gungan fashion to the other three and then sat abruptly on the ground with a huff.

"The rest of you are to report to the escape pods," Tobin finished. "There are sufficient pods to hold all passengers and crew. Your captain will be left with an emergency transmitter which he can then use to summon aid. If you cooperate fully, we will leave the pods unharmed and you will survive. This liner is insured, and so all of you will be fully compensated for your losses. You cannot, however, be compensated for your deaths if you resist. Please choose your next course of action well."

The Ithorian captain strode to the front of the crowd. "All crew are to aid the passengers to the escape pods. Ensure all passengers are accounted for. Then the crew is to make its way to the staff pods."

The mixed crew of Ithorian and hired personnel snapped to attention and proceeded to guide the passengers toward the escape pods. The captain himself lingered. Tobin sighed and leapt easily over the balcony rail to the floor below and moved toward the captain. "Are you trying to be brave?"

The Ithorian said, "These people are under my care. I will not leave this ship until I see they are left unharmed."

"Should I shoot him?" Kenth asked. Tobin could sense the man's hesitancy. He knew that Shandor would shoot if ordered, but he wouldn't like it.

Tobin studied the creature for a moment before he shook his head. "There are far too few honorable creatures in the galaxy, Kenth. We need to cherish those we have, even if they are not on our side. Keep him with the others." He looked over his shoulder. "Silmari, please ensure that at least one pod is left and give the transmitter to one of the other pods."

The Devaronian female nodded and walked away.

"That is most generous of you," the Ithorian said.

"I only kill when I have to, Captain," Tobin said. "And given the choice, I would much rather not harm anyone. You've met your side of the bargain by cooperating. I'll do my part to assure you of my intentions. We want your ship, and we're taking it. But we have no desire for bloodshed."

The Ithorian had nothing to say.

~~The Last Jedi~~

~~The Last Jedi~~

"What is your intention with me and my family?" Hendt Reindel said.

Reindel, his wife Rala and their granddaughter Sheri sat in a luxury suite on board the _Star of Ithoria_. Sana Fieliel, Askad Dekarta, and the Ithorian Captain Hashalad Jawalla occupied various chairs in the suite.

Tobin met them with only Silmari at his side. He could see Dekarta briefly think of overpowering them, and then dismiss the idea.

Tobin walked across the floor toward Reindel, who stood. "Dr. Reindel, do you know what this is?" Tobin held up his ring, gripped between his fingers.

Reindel leaned over to study the ring for a moment before his eyes widened and he collapsed back into his seat. "Hendt, what is it?" his wife said as she clutched at him.

"It appears to be an Imperial signet ring," he finally said. "A very good reproduction."

Tobin tossed the ring to him. "You were on that list for only one reason, Master Reindel. You are one of five royal genealogists and the official keeper of the Fel family records. It was one of your ancestors who designed the Fel signet rings. Is it, or is it not, a genuine royal signet ring?"

Reindel looked to his wife, then back to the ring. Finally, he reached into his pocket and removed a palm-sized device.

"You mean to say he has an analyzer in his pocket?" the Gungan, Dekarta, said with a roll of his stalked eyes.

"He is the royal record keeper," Tobin explained, while keeping his eyes on Hendt Reindel. "He must be ready at all times to verify any record or claim."

The genealogist looked up from his analysis. "It is liquid polymer gold. It has the appropriate DNA imprint and switch. It is a genuine Royal signet ring."

The ring flew from his hands into Tobin's. "I wasn't a hundred percent sure myself," he admitted quietly to Silmari as he slowly slipped it on so all could see.

"That is not possible," Hendt said.

"Do you know who Sariah Solo Fel was?"

"She was the daughter of Emperor Soontir Solo Fel II. She died at an early age without issue."

"She did not die in the shuttle explosion, and she did have issue," Tobin said calmly. "You saw the markings on the ring. Each ring is marked with the initials of the issuer. The ring was issued by Soontir Fel II, in honor of his beloved daughter Sariah."

The Omwati woman, Sana Fieliel, snorted. "You mean this is all some outlandish claim to be royalty? You're abnormal. You can't be royal."

"Of course," Tobin said coolly, still staring at Reindel. "We all know there were never any Abnormals in the Fel Dynasty. At least not after Sariah."

"He's lying," Dakarta muttered.

Tobin shrugged. "You've done what I needed you to do," Tobin said. "You and your family are free to board the escape pod with the captain. I would highly recommend you not tell anyone of our meeting, though. The Emperor will murder anyone with knowledge of the Fel's abnormal markers. After all, he killed everyone with knowledge of his own daughter's midi-chlorian count."

"Those are very dangerous words you say," Reindel said with wide-eyes.

"And even more dangerous for you and your family to hear. I sincerely hope your wife and granddaughter can keep secrets." He nodded to Silmari, who motioned for the stricken Reindel family to follow her.

Tobin turned his attention to the rest of his guests.

"So, on to you two. I have a job for you both. It is going to be very, very lucrative to you if you accept."

Fieliel snorted. "And if we refuse?"

Tobin's smile would have made Darth Valus proud. "You won't refuse."

~~The Last Jedi~~

~~The Last Jedi~~

Dubrillion was a dead world. It was the site of one of the first battles of the great Yhuuzan Vong war, and served as an enemy base during much of the conflict. After the war ended, various factions tried to control the world, until the war between the Empire and the Galactic Alliance. In that last great spasm of destruction between Empire and Democracy, Dubrillion was pounded by Alliance Forces so thoroughly that no life remained, and the soil so thoroughly irradiated that no life could start anew for many generations to come.

So the Empire naturally turned it into a dumping ground. Decommissioned ships were literally dropped on the planet with just enough repulsor power to keep from splitting the crust. The great star destroyers of the past were dropped one-by-one onto the surface of the dead planet. The old Alliance _Scythe-_class battle cruisers were towed to the outer rim and dropped there as well. Radiation from old hyper-matter reactors could do no harm to already dead soil, and so the whole world was covered with the dead skeletons of past wars.

The _Star of Ithoria_, rechristened as the _Star Sword_, held a low orbit over the otherwise empty heavens over Dubrillion. The _Destiny_ floated a few hundred thousand klicks away in a synchronous orbit.

"The whole planet reeks with hypermatter radiation," Lieutenant Commander Soonta said. The former Imperial still wore her old uniform, but one with crimson stripes running down the length of the pants legs. Now that all the uniforms had been modified, Corra Bard suggested color piping to signify duty areas.

Red was officers, yellow for enlisted. All were paid at Empire-standard.

Tobin nodded, and then turned to Sana Fieliel. The Omwati ran a hand through the red feathers on her head. "It's a difficult proposition," she finally said. "The cost of recycling was high enough that the Empire didn't bother, but even so, most of the components have been exposed to harsh conditions for a century or more. You'd be lucky to be able to assemble one working ship out of every hundred."

"That would still be a fleet," Tobin pointed out.

"You don't have the personnel to do it," the Gungan, Dekarta, said. "Even with your colonists, you don't have the personnel. A single shipyard has a minimum of a hundred thousand workers and three times that many droids."

Tobin turned back to Fieliel. "If I have the personnel could you do it?"

"I could try," she said finally. "But you're going to need dedicated engineering teams. This isn't something colonists can do." She was referring to the still settling colony on Sestia. "And you have to understand that you are asking me to commit treason."

"I'm not asking you," Tobin said. "I'm making you. So far I've used nice measures. But don't think for a second that I won't use harsher techniques." He looked back out the view ports to the planet below. It was a dirty gray color, poisoned by war and refuse. "I know where to find the best engineers in the galaxy. Start putting together an action plan and the materials you are likely to need." He turned to Sula Santari, who was there to represent what workforce her people could provide. "Do what you can to help her, please. You'll be working out of the _Star Sword_. Silmari and Shindo Bard will be in overall command until I return."

"Where are you going?" Santari asked.

"I'm going to get those engineers," Tobin said.

~~The Last Jedi~~

~~The Last Jedi~~

Moff Hershied put the holopad down on her desk and took a long, shaky breath. Davin stood near her desk at stiff attention, while across from her stood Admiral Gest'aka. The Mon Calamari also stood at attention. The only thing that moved were his large, aquatic eyelids. "You've verified this report?" she said.

"Personally," the Mon Cal admiral said. "The Ithorian crewmembers state the entire Imperial contingent was killed. The pirates took the ship with only a single casualty among the crew, and that crewman attempted to resist. Captain Jawalla was recovered a short time later with Sir Hendt Reindel and his family."

"Reindel? The Royal genealogist?"

"Yes, Moff."

"What does he have to say?"

"He demanded immediate transportation to Corusca and refused to give any report. Given his station, I believed it was a matter of prudence to comply with his request post haste."

Whatever else could be said about them, Hershied did not employ idiots. "A good decision, Admiral." She stood up and stepped around the desk. "Do we have the resources to post escorts to all luxury liners?"

"Not without stripping all but our stationary defenses," Gest'aka said. "We could set a criteria limit for escorts, however—certain high profile luxury liners; certain merchant shipping. We can also give temporary dispensation to the Unions to increase their own security forces. That would ease the need for escorts significantly."

Hershied closed her eyes in deep thought. "Letting the Unions arm themselves would help in the short term," she said, "but could cause long term problems. His Majesty would not approve. No, the only way to solve the problem is to remove its source. We need to remove this Tobin S'Artin. The way to do that is to remove his support structures."

The only sound that followed was the heavy, wet breathing of the Mon Cal. "Are you suggesting attacking the Rings, Admiral?"

"Convince me why I shouldn't," Hershied said.

"Because we would take heavier losses than Grand Moff Dinteri would accept," the Admiral said quickly. "We know from our sources there that the Rings are very nearly as heavily defended as this base. And with the number of ships the pirates as a whole have, we would lose at minimum a third of our sector fleet. Possible more. Any attack would have to be numerically overwhelming."

Hershied huffed, but did not argue. The military answered to the Moffs, but the Moffs did not last long if they did not listen to what the military said.

"Perhaps we could attack the pirate shipping directly," Davin said timidly.

"Explain," Hershied commanded.

"We set up response stations along all the main shipping routes," he said. "We can't be everywhere at once, but we can at least have reaction teams close by. If we cut reaction times down and hit attacking pirates hard while letting the rest of the pirate population know that this S'Artin is the reason for the crackdown, they may assist us in turning the pirate over."

Dila looked over and saw Gest'aka nodding. "That is a sound suggestion, Moff Hershied," he said. "We could easily divert sufficient forces to pockets along the main trade lanes. Perhaps a frigate and two corvettes per station."

"This S'Artin is flying one of our own frigates," Hershied said. "I think perhaps two frigates minimum."

Gest'aka agreed. "It will be done, Moff Hershied." The admiral bowed and quickly left the room.

Hershied stood and ambled over to Davin. "That was a very good idea, Davin," she said in a throaty voice. "Such suggestions should be thoroughly rewarded. Wouldn't you say?"

"Wholeheartedly, Moff Hershied," Davin agreed.


	22. Slaves

Chapter 21 review responses were posted in my forums.

* * *

**Chapter Twenty-Two: Slaves**

While Moff Hershied worked feverishly to improve her staff's morale, Tobin met with Kenth and Shindo in the captain's quarters of the _Destiny_ to make plans.

Tobin needed workers—more workers than he could hire from the Rings. In fact, he needed a dedicated workforce with expertise in ship construction and refitting. Of all the beings in the galaxy, only one species met that requirement.

Wookiees.

Technically, the Wookiees of Kashyyyk were not slaves. They were multi-generational political prisoners and indentured servants. Kashyyyk was one of the last of the old Alliance planets. They never surrendered and continued aiding the Alliance remnant until the very end. The Empire lost half a sector fleet taking the Wookiee home world. The cost to the Wookiees was even worse, however. With their population cut from the billions to a few hundred million, every family experienced unbelievable loss. Whole clans—whole cities—were wiped out in the fighting.

However, the damage they inflicted upon the Empire was so staggering, reparations were imposed. Those reparations took generations to fulfill, essentially pulling the whole planet into indentured servitude and casting the children of Kashyyk to the stars.

Centuries later the Wookiee population on Kashyyk was still under two hundred million. Many Wookiees were shipped off world to work while still in their teens, or like the Guildmaster of the Rings were born in space in abject slavery.

Tobin's initial idea of going straight to Kashyyk lasted only long enough for him to examine the defenses of the planet. The Empire had two orbital weapons platforms around Kashyyk, but the weapons were not to defend. They were all pointed at the planet surface, and the threat of total annihilation is what kept the rest of the Wookiees across the galaxy from trying to liberate their home world.

Getting the majority of the species killed would not aid Tobin's cause or make the survivors inclined to help him. So they had to cast their hopes elsewhere.

"Slave transports," Bard finally said after almost two hours of brainstorming.

"A good idea if we knew where they were going," Shandor said. "The Empire doesn't release the shipping schedules for the Wookiee transports for fear of free Wookiees trying to attack."

Tobin was no longer even looking at the two men as they spoke. Instead he was looking at a holo image of that sector of space. "Shindo," he said, "how large are the transports?"

"Massive," Shindo said. "Two thousand meters easy. They can carry up to a quarter million slaves in hard confinement, which is the only way they transport Wookiees. They usually take them to a central hub in a given sector and then break them into their separate sections. Those Wookiees who've served their time are returned the same way."

"Are the transports armed?" Tobin asked.

"Minimal armament," Shandor said. "But they always have an escort. Usually a frigate. They're not going to let a slave transport go without a fight."

Tobin nodded. "Thank you both. I need to meditate on this. In the meantime, contact the _Ulicia_ and have her swing by the Rings to pick up the next batch of Shrief's people before joining us at the rendezvous coordinates."

Kenth and Shindo both gave a sharp nod before they stood to leave. When they were gone, Tobin found himself wishing for his holocron, but he had left it with Aaris so that Tobin's many-times grandmother could begin the young man on basic meditation techniques which provided the foundation for both Jedi and Sith teachings.

Instead, he sank into the Force without the soothing aid of Leia Solo's voice and reached out his senses. From his dealings with the free Wookiees on the Rings, he knew the sense of the creatures. They were vibrant, strong and proud. They were beaten, but never broken, and roared into the Force their defiance and strength. He needed that power; he needed their expertise and their unwillingness to surrender.

He passed his need into the Force, and the Force responded. A sudden memory rose in his mind—of the utter agony and blackened rage he felt as he tore through the _Destiny's_ old Imperial crew. Of the blood on his hands and face. Then he saw another image—a giant cylinder with engines plowing it through the stars with a frigate a few thousand klicks off its bow. Behind them was a red giant planet, and a name came to him then.

Stavin V. The transport was going to emerge from hyperspace near Stavin V. But the only way to secure the transport was to take the frigate. And the only way his forces could take an Imperial frigate without massive losses was if Tobin himself did the deed.

He emerged from the meditation with a long, ragged breath. It took several moments to calm his breathing down, even employing his mother's techniques. The idea of taking on a frigate by himself was terrifying. He was able to take the _Destiny_ through sheer speed, rage and surprise. To purposely do the same with another ship simply did not seem possible.

He stood on stiff legs and looked at the chrono. His meditation had taken hours. It was now the middle of the night. He acted on his need to move and stepped out of his quarters. The halls were mostly empty—those not on duty were sleeping due to the hour.

He wasn't sure what brought him to the primary med bay. There were no bodies there, nor injured crew. In fact, the room was empty save for a droid that activated upon his entrance. "May I be of assistance, Captain?" the droid asked.

"No, you may return to your recharging."

"Thank you, captain." The droid's eye sensors went dark again as Tobin walked to the wall of stasis drawers. He opened one of them and stared down at the lifeless steel shelf. It was the one that held _her_. He could see here even now.

"Captain?" Tobin looked up, genuinely surprised. The Medic, Shina Bootha, stood just inside the door staring at him. She held a robe closed over her wide body. She saw the open shelf, and then nodded. "Is there anything I can help you with?" she finally asked.

"No, thank you," Tobin said as he closed the drawer.

He started to leave when the medic cleared her throat. "Are you going to have to do it again?"

He paused, one brow raised. "Do what again?"

"What you did here, because of her?"

Tobin's breath caught. "How could you possibly…"

"I don't have the Force," Shina said, "but I have twenty years of experience treating the bodies and souls of soldiers. I can see it in your face."

Tobin looked back at the shelf. "My Sith master taught me all life had a price. To kill was nothing so long as you could pay that price."

"What is the price of the people you will have to kill?"

"The freedom of maybe as many as a quarter million sentient beings who have been considered slaves for centuries."

"Is there any other way to free them?"

"Not without risking their lives and our own."

Shina nodded as she considered it. "And when you free them, Captain, what next?"

"I build a fleet to free more," he said. "And then I will build more ships, until I can challenge the throne itself. And when I have the throne that was denied to my ancestors, I will stop the persecution of the Force-strong. I will end the slavery."

"A return to the Alliance?"

Tobin shook his head. "The galaxy has moved past a pure democratic government. The collapse of the Republic in both its forms showed that. The constitutional monarchy as it now stands could work, but only with the right people and the right constitution."

"So you're going to tear the galaxy apart to keep it the way it is?"

"It is my hope I won't have to tear the galaxy apart," Tobin said. He held up his signet ring. "My ancestor was the elder child. My line should have been dominate. Remove the current Emperor, and it will be."

"The Emperor's daughter would then inherit."

He turned to the woman, and smiled grimly. "The Princess is Force-sensitive. The Emperor hid her test results and killed all those who know."

The medic shook her head. "How could you know that?"

"A dead Sith showed me." Tobin took a deep, steadying breath. "Thank you for your time, Doctor. It's been good talking to you." He nodded to the older woman before he turned to leave. His shoulders were set and his back was straight.

He knew what he had to do.

~~Last Jedi~~

~~Last Jedi~~

"Imperial frigate _Absolute_, this is Shuttle _Tyderium_ out of Riisie IX Hub declaring an emergency. We have lost all power and life support and request immediate assistance."

Tobin smiled at the name of the shuttle. It was highly unlikely anyone would make the historical connection.

Through the viewports, he could see the massive, ungainly cylinder in which the Wookiee slaves were transported, while the frigate itself was a much smaller dagger beside it.

"Shuttle _Tyderium_, this is the _Absolute._ What happened?"

"We were attacked by another Imperial frigate, _Absolute_. The ship claimed to be called the _Destiny_. We were lucky to escape in any condition. I have a report for Moff Hershied."

"We've heard of that ship," came the audio-only response. "We're on our way. Hang tight."

The frigate changed its course and in a matter of minutes had covered the eighty thousand clicks between the slave ship and the shuttle. Tobin looked behind him at the squad of Kenth's troopers. They were standard trooper armor, save for a single red epaulette over their left shoulders. It was the only way to mark them as his men. Not only were they troopers, but the twenty men were trained as an emergency crew to run the frigate itself if necessary.

Tobin started taking calming, meditative breaths. As they felt the grapples seize the ship, he walked to the loading ramp and turned to address his men. "You have never seen me fight, so I want to warn you all once again to cover my back only. You are not to attempt to protect me except to ensure that no one comes behind us. The frontal assault will be me only."

"We understand, Force-blessed," one of the troopers said. "Excuse me, I meant to say Captain."

Tobin nodded and then straightened the Imperial captain's uniform he wore.

Soon enough, they were secured inside the ship's hanger bay. At Tobin's command, the ramp swung down and he walked down the ramp. In front of him stood a lieutenant and fifty troopers in tight formation.

"Lieutenant," Tobin said with a nod. "A very good thing you were out here. I was afraid we were not going to make it."

"I understand, Captain. Welcome aboard. If you and your men would follow me? New security protocols require you and your men to remain in an isolation unit until we are able to confirm your identity."

"Yes, I know," Tobin bluffed. "I remember submitting a brief on the idea. Well, let's go. We've had a very bad day and could use a hot meal."

The lieutenant led the way, and Tobin's men fell into step behind him while the fifty troopers followed them.

The moment they were inside the halls of the ship where they could not easily be ejected into space, Tobin Force-grabbed the lieutenant and tossed him over the double line of his men into the larger squad of the ship's troopers.

Kenth's men immediately fell to their knees and opened fire while Tobin unleashed a maelstrom of Force lightening. Alarms suddenly blared to life as fifty men died within forty seconds.

"Come on!" Tobin yelled. He turned and ran toward the nearest command-access decks.

The battle that followed brought back many painful memories, but at the same time was different as well. Whereas the taking of the _Destiny_ was done through rage and pain, the taking of the _Absolute_ was done in cold blood. His reactions were just as swift and deadly, but without the red that colored everything he saw.

The ship's defenses were as lethal as ever, but Tobin was still able to bypass them or damage them sufficiently for his squad to get past.

He lost three men to rear counterattacks, but eventually he progressed through each deck so quickly the ship's personnel were unable to mount any form of significant counter attack.

Eventually he fell into a detached daze, amazing even himself at the sheer destructive capabilities that he possessed. That so very many men and women could fall to him was astounding.

Finally he made it to the command deck. This time he did not hesitate and quickly killed both the captain and commander. He then demanded the lieutenant commander's surrender. The young man, filled with pride and duty, tried to pull his weapon.

Tobin beheaded him with a quick swipe of a lightsaber. "Who's next?"

The young lieutenant, a Muun fresh out of the Academy, choose discretion over valor and surrendered.

Tobin walked to the communications station and sent the message. Three minutes later a second shuttle appeared from hyperspace and quickly docked in the ship.

The shuttle was crammed with fifty engineers and specialists hired from the Rings. The survivors from the original crew were quickly transferred to the brig while the smaller emergency crew got the ship back under control and returned to its path around the slave ship.

"The transport is signaling us," Kenth reported.

Tobin opened the channel. "Transport, this is the _Absolute_. We've been notified that there may be an explosive on your ship. Stop all engines and prepare to be boarded with heavy scanning crews."

The terrified captain of the slaver ship acknowledged and the huge vessel stopped acceleration. It continued to move forward on momentum alone, but it took more power to try and stop such a ship than was economical. So the _Absolute_ fell even with the transport and Tobin and his original squad of twenty troopers boarded the shuttle _Tyderium_ and made their way to the slaver ship.

It was with a profound sense of relief that the slave ship held only a crew of two hundred civilians. Because the Wookiees were transported in individual stasis pods, there was no danger of a violent revolt, so there was no need to stock the ship with troopers.

In fact, as Tobin's men flooded the flight deck, he noticed that the primarily human crew did not put up a fight at all. The captain was an older woman with dirty gray hair shorn almost to her scalp, and a scar on one cheek that bisected her left eye. She wore a yellow lens implant in that eye, and looked Tobin with one raised brow.

"You're the pirate we've been hearing about," she said as he stepped onto her deck.

"I am," Tobin said. "Are you going to fight?"

"Did the _Absolute_?"

"Yes. Most of the crew is dead. It's my ship now."

The captain nodded thoughtfully. "Officially of course I must resist to the fullest extent of my abilities. However, I am not in the Navy. I do have one question for you."

Tobin noticed that the rest of her crew had backed away from their controllers into the center of the flight deck, which itself was larger than the command deck of an imperial frigate. "What's that?" Tobin asked.

"Are you going hurt them?"

The question surprised him. "Why do you ask?"

"I'm not in this business to abuse them," she said. "I've heard of some captains that will let two of the males out and sting them with stun prods until they go mad in pain and tear into each other, claws extended. Do you realize what a horrid thing that is to do to a Wookiee? The use of their claws in combat is one of their oldest social taboos. It strips them of all their dignity for the enjoyment of a depraved few bastards."

"And so you're a slaver for their own good?"

"I make sure they get to their destination unharmed, and unlike some captains, I make sure those done with their service get home alive."

Tobin felt nothing but honesty from the woman. He opened his senses to the rest of the crew and was genuinely surprised when he felt similar sentiments from all of them. "I'm going to free them," he finally said. "And then I'm going to ask if there are any that wish to help me free others."

"For what purpose?" the captain asked. "The Empire will hunt them down eventually."

"Not if they're behind a fleet of ships and an army of those determined to change Imperial policy."

The captain took a step toward him. "There is a rumor floating through the merchant fleets that you helped the Unitarians escape Ulicia."

"Since I am Force-blessed, it would be hypocritical not to help those that believe in me," Tobin said.

"My name is Taryn Deastri. And the imperial tracer is on deck forty-three, row ten."

Tobin grinned. "Is it, now?"

They discovered the hidden tracking device in an empty stasis pod. They moved the device into on of the _Absolute's_ shuttles and sent the shuttle flying toward the slaver's ultimate destination. With that done, Tobin sat the crew down in the command deck with the captain.

"My name is Tobin Solo Fel Artin," he said. "For obvious reasons I shortened my name to Tobin S'Artin. I am the last descendent of what was the oldest child of Emperor Soonter Solo Fel II. The Princess Sariah was forced into hiding when her brother declared all Force-sensitives anathema. This was because the princess was a trained Imperial Knight, a loyal member of the Imperial family trained in the Jedi Arts. She came from a long line of Royal Force-sensitive offspring, going back to the first Empress, Jaina Solo, who herself was a Jedi Master, the Daughter of a Jedi Master, and the Granddaugther of a Dark Lord of the Sith. And it is my intent to stop the persecution of Force-sensitive children."

The crew listened raptly, hearing a version of history not allowed in schools any more.

"I am gathering forces to support my claim for the throne. I need Wookiees to build ships, but I will not compel them. There is a new, fresh world with a new colony of Unitarians. The Wookiees will be free there, and only those who wish to help free more of their kind need assist me. When I have enough ships, I will wrest Kashyyk away from Imperial Control. When I have sufficient forces, I shall wrest the throne from the current Emperor. Those who wish to join me are welcome. Those who wish to leave can do so freely."

"Aren't you afraid the Emperor will find out?" one of the crewman asked.

"When he finds out, it will be he who is afraid," Tobin said. "I am not a pirate, not any more. I am a revolutionary. I am a prince fighting for the throne that is rightfully mine. Those who fight with me will be rewarded. Those who fight against me will suffer. And those who wish not to fight at all—I will leave you be."

Tobin was not surprised that the crew supported him, not with the feeling of hope emanating from them. Before the hour was up the ship was heading at top speed toward _Sestia_ III with a new frigate in escort.

~~Last Jedi~~

~~Last Jedi~~

Tobin returned to the _Absolute_ to go through the captain's databanks. As was so typical, the captain had written his security codes down in a slip secured under his desk. It was a simple matter for Tobin to get into the Naval Net. The captain did not have access to everything, of course, but the messages he did have access to were revealing.

The Imperial reaction to Tobin's raids was well thought out—brilliant even. Its one flaw though was that it assumed Tobin was a pirate seeking pirate targets. His targets were much, much larger than that.

He moved on from security announcements and directives and found the ship's itinerary.

The transport ship was due to pick up a group Wookiees from Itaelaz III in five days time from a central processing hub. Another hundred and fifty thousand sentient beings held in secure pens. The problem was what to do about the Outer Rim hub that was expecting their own shipment of Wookiees.

He sent out a secured holonet message on the shuttle's channel and smiled when he saw the young Unitarian in Imperial uniform. "For…I mean, Captain!" the young woman said. "Is everything…I mean, orders, sir?"

She looked like a child playing army. "At ease, Tial. I need you to drop out of hyperspace and stay put for a bit. How many supplies do you have?"

"Enough for two weeks," she said. "If…would it be okay if I study?"

"Absolutely," Tobin said. "Just maintain holonet silence unless I call you. But study all you want. Play, do whatever you want."

Behind Tial came another young person, this one a handsome young man near Tial's age.

"Anything?" he asked with a grin that made Tial blush.

Tobin fought back a frown. He did not want to ruin the young lover's time, and it would be boring. "What I don't know won't hurt me. Your own your own with your parents, though."

"Thank you, sir!" Tial said. "Do you want us off the space lane?"

"Good thinking. Yes, travel outside the hyperspace lane and then go silent. I'll be in contact with you in a few days."

"Yes, captain!" Tial said.

The holorelay when blank, but not before he heard her giggle.

He stared into the silence of the captain's quarters, trying his damnedest not to think of the last time he heard such happiness.

Eventually he shook himself out of his melancholy and composed a notice to be posted onto the naval boards. It read that Worker Transport 2314-AABR suffered a hyperdrive failure and was under repair. Estimated time for repair was three days. It would return at that time.

He then contacted Captain Deastri on the transport. "Taryn," he said, "did you know about your pick up at Itaelaz III?"

"I'd sort of forgotten it in the excitement," the older captain admitted.

"Right now the Empire thinks your transport stalled out in route to the outer rim. What would happen if the transport showed up at Itaelez without the beacon?"

"Well, nothing," Deastri said. "The beacon is monitored by Kashyyk control, not the navy proper. Control monitors and keeps track of all indentured Wookiees. But the trick would only work once."

"Once is enough," Tobin said.

* * *

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Thank you all for reading!


	23. Ryloth, the First

My apologies for last week's delay. Review responses for the last chapter can be found in my forums.

* * *

**Chapter Twenty-Three: Ryloth the First**

Sula Santari was not amused when Tobin told her the colony was about to get an influx of one hundred and thirty-two thousand Wookiees. Not amused at all.

"And how are we going to feed them?" she demanded. "We've only just decanted our livestock. We're going to be eating food stores for at least a year before our meat sources become self-sustaining. I'll admit the crops are going better, but we both know Wookiees are primarily carnivorous."

"The planet has megafauna," Tobin pointed out. "A lot of it, too. Let the Wookiees carve out their own area, and they'll be fine."

"Wookiees really don't like humans," she said, truly frightened at the prospect.

"Perhaps. But more accurately they don't like Imperials."

To assure the frayed nerves of the colonists, Tobin was on hand when Captain Deastri woke the first Wookiees. "This is the eldest," she said by way of explanation. "Kaasssht has gone on four work runs, three more tours than necessary, to look over the younger males and make sure they don't do anything that will get them all killed. If we can convince him, he'll take care of the others. He's the closest thing to a leader the Wookiees have."

The pod was the first in a row of five thousand that extended the length of the huge ship. It opened with a hiss, and the two and a half meter monster inside stretched with a huge yawn. Tobin noticed one of his fangs was broken.

"Yellow-eye," the Wookiee nodded in greeting to Deastri. The guttural growls and grunts were translated by his implant. "We arrived?"

"We are someplace new," Deastri said. She nodded to Tobin. "This is the one you heard spoken of before you boarded. He claims to be a descendent of a Force-strong princess."

The old Wookiee looked hard at Tobin, then sniffed. "Humans change too quick to know a line or not. Tell me the name of this princess."

"I am a direct descendent of Sariah Fel and Cray Skywalker Cartin," Tobin said. "My mother's name was Jalia. According to her I was fathered by the Force itself."

The ancient Wookiee reared back as if struck. "Few humans know those names any more. But I remember. I was a young buck when the ban came down. We Wookiees knew this was a lie, for the Jedi were ever our friends. But none listened to us. But I remember the Princess. She fought for our freedom before the Imperial Senate."

"My mother told me about her," Tobin said. "And she gave me this." He held up his signet ring.

"What do you want of my people?" the Wookiee said as he stared at the mark of the Imperial family.

"Your freedom, and your help to free more," he said. "We are at a new world with a new colony. You're people are free to live here as long as you need. In return, if you have any who wish to help, we are going to need engineering teams to build and maintain a fleet."

"You will make us do this?"

"I will ask, not make," Tobin said. "You will be a free people, and will outnumber the humans here. The colony has established laws for itself that we ask your people to obey, but otherwise you are free."

The elder looked to Deastri, who nodded. "We are over a new world," she confirmed for the Elder. "Mega fauna to hunt and eat. He took our escort single-handedly, and if we have time, after emptying the ship we are going to go pick up even more of your people and bring them here."

"What is your name, human?"

"Tobin Solo Fel Artin," Tobin said.

"If your words are true," the Wookiee sniffed, "then you shall have your help."

"Then let's wake your people," Tobin said. "The transport shuttle is ready to being taking your people down to the surface."

They recruited the Wookiees themselves to help wake the others, and even then it took almost ten hours to unload the whole transport. Kaasssht was on the first shuttle and met with Sula and the other colony leaders. Sula, while nervous, was firmly in administrator mode when she told the ancient Wookiee about what rules they had established and the animals they had encountered so far.

She then told them that anywhere outside their crop land was available to them if they wanted it. Kaasssht thanked her with a snuffle that only his interpreter could figure out, and then turned to those who came down with him and roared with approval. The answering howls gave the colonists chills.

Two days later, Tobin assigned his first mission to another commander. This one was to Itaelez. He assigned Shindo Bard as captain of the _Absolute_ with Sor'ai Soonta as his commander. Her knowledge of Imperial etiquette would guide him. Deastri and her crew resumed their places on the transport, and left shortly after.

When they were gone, Tobin took a shuttle for the day-long flight to Dubrillion. The Ithorian liner was still in orbit over the planet with the _Destiny_ and _Ulicia_ a few thousand meters off its port side.

A quick check confirmed that both Askad Dekarta and Sana Fieliel were aboard the liner.

Tobin selected the _Sword of Stars_ as his target for several reasons. Although he led the others to believe it was to get Hendt Reindel to look at his ring, in fact that was just a happy accident. No, when his agent on the Rings obtained the passenger list, there were only two beings he wanted to meet—Sana Fieliel, Master Engineer with Kuat Drive Yards, and Askad Dekarta, certified heavy weapons specialist with Seinar Fleet Systems.

Fieliel was brusque at best and commonly angry at her new-found job. Tobin matched her salary from KDY and pretty much gave her everything she asked for. It only seemed to make her angrier.

Askad Dekarta fell back into burning sarcasm. Like Fieliel, he received everything he asked for that was within his area of expertise. Tobin did have to draw the line at a Gungan harem since he did not know of any female Gungans in the sector. But otherwise the weapons specialist was well compensated.

No actual work had begun because they did not have the workers to do it yet, but when he walked into the main ballroom that the two engineers had commandeers, he saw that they had been busy. Kenth Shandor and a guard of troopers sat nearby and all snapped to attention when Tobin entered.

"At east," Tobin said. "How have they been?"

"They seem to be dealing with their captivity by working," he said. "We've done close fly-bys and scans of the surface a dozen times at least with Feliel. And Dekarta has been over this ship a dozen times at least. They demanded the CASD boards a few days ago."

The Computer-Aided Ship Design boards were ten-meter wide, two and three dimensional displays on surfaces that could be unrolled from the two posts on each side. Each engineer would make notes with their fingers and interact directly with the models.

Tobin watched the two of them working in oblivion before he cleared his throat. "We've got over a hundred thousand Wookiees settling in on the colony world now," he said.

The two spun around. Fieliel especially seemed surprised. "How'd you get so many?"

"I stole them, of course. We should have another hundred and fifty coming in the next few days. I don't know how many will actually work for us, but it should be a large number. What are you going to need next?"

"You're insane," she said. "You stand there and casually tell me you've just stolen a quarter million Wookiees from the Empire?"

"Yes." He took a step forward until he faced the Omwati woman. "I took their escort frigate by myself and killed almost the entire crew. So now that I have the Wookiees, what else will you need."

She gulped audibly. "A…a shipyard."

"What kind?"

"Well," Fieliel said thoughtfully as she slipped from terror mode back into work mode, "a KDY type XII yard would be ideal. But the type X class would be just as good for our purposes, and it has its own hyperdrive system. It only has four berths, but has a class 5 hyperdrive."

Tobin nodded. "Do you know where we would find an X-class yard?"

"Kuat, of course. Fondor. Bilbringi. Bastion. I think Ryloth may have one too."

"Ryloth? A rim world?"

"It's a traffic stop."

Tobin nodded. "Thank you."

~~Last Jedi~~

~~Last Jedi~~

Tobin did not trust himself to come up with a plan to steal a shipyard by himself. And so he called a meeting two days after Taryn and Shindo returned with the additional free Wookiees.

He held the meeting aboard the _Destiny_ with most of his senior people. The Bards were there, as were the Frarks. Soonta was there, along with Shandor. Joining the group for the first time was Taryn Deastri and two Wookiees, the elder Tobin was now calling Kash, and another younger female named Chabacaala.

"And there you have it," Tobin said after presenting the problem. "Ideas?"

"Well, after freeing the Wookiees, the _Absolute_ is definitely considered lost," Deastri said. "So you can't just fly in under that transponder code."

It was Chabacaala who suggested hacking into the Naval tracking system. From the executive briefing room, the Wookiee engineer also proved herself an able slicer and soon had the list of active frigates of the same size and make as the _Destiny_.

"The _Ironclaw_ is the furthest from Ryloth," Soonta noted after scanning the list. "It would take the longest time for them to verify the _Ironclaw's_ location.

"So walk me through," Tobin said to her. "We arrive and provide the shipyard the _Ironclaw_'s authentication and security codes. They enter it into their system. What happens next?"

Commander Soonta explained. "The signal is routed via holonet to the Naval Data Clearinghouse. Dedicated droid brains sort the data and compare it to existing records. Standard protocol would be that if they received a duplicate code, they would immediately send an inquiry to the last known location of the ship. If that ship responds accordingly, and it appears there is an actual duplication of codes, both ships are ordered to stand down pending investigation and a general alert is issued to the Moffs in each sector."

"How long?"

"The longest delay is the distance," Soonta said quietly. "There is a ten minute signal delay even on the holonet with these distances, and another seven or eight minute delay to verify with the real _Ironclaw_. Then another ten minutes to get the emergency signal back to the station."

"So twenty five minutes to be safe," Tobin said.

"Yes, sir."

"At any given time, how many people are on a mobile shipyard of this size?" Tobin asked.

"A hundred thousand at most," Soonta said. "The problem will be the three hundred thousand troopers station on the yards."

Tobin blinked. "Why so many?"

"To guard the Wookiees, of course," Kash's translator pronounced. "Three troopers for each Wookiee."

"That's insane," Shindo Bard muttered. "It requires three times the workers than if they just hired workers fairly."

"Slavery has its own logic," Tobin said. He looked directly at the two Wookiees. "It becomes less about efficiency and more about degradation. Kash, will the Wookiees support us?"

The Elder Wookiee nodded. "Yes. But openly fighting the troopers will be difficult. The station has an interior defense system comparable to a very large frigate. They defend these stations like a command node."

Tobin leaned back in his seat and examined the list of ships. "So essentially we have less than half an hour to subdue three hundred thousand troopers, evacuate six thousand personnel, and steal the station before the planetary defense forces become aware of what's happening."

"There's one other possibility," Chabacaala said. "We could stop the original signal from getting through to the clearinghouse."

"Holonet nodes are not just satellites in space," Soonta warned. "They are modified Tendrando Type III orbital defense platforms. They are filled with battle droids and the stations themselves are ringed with enough heavy turbolaser and laser cannon emplacements to turn back a fleet of ships. The holonet is considered the most important asset of the Empire and they defend it well."

Tobin nodded as he went through their options. "Any chance of intercepting the signal prior to reaching the node?"

Soonta shrugged. "I don't think so. By the time it reaches the node it is already a broad signal, too broad for any one ship to try and intercept and stop. Short of a logic bomb, I don't know what we could do."

That was a new term for Tobin. "What's a logic bomb?"

"It's a hostile droid personality matrix sent in with the signal," Soonta explained. "It acts like an AI virus and attempts to replicate and affect vital systems. Most stations and ships are hardened against them, which is why you don't hear about them anymore."

A flicker in the Force made Tobin smile. "So what would happen if we were to drop one on the holonet node anyway?"

"As soon as the matrix tried to exert control over any other system, the dedicated droid brains in the station would attack in and destroy it."

"What if we dropped a thousand droid bombs?"

"Same thing," Sor'ai said with wide eyes, "only slower."

"A lot slower," Chabacaala added. "The AI level of the matrix would not be that much weaker than the platforms droid brains, but the platform probably only has a dozen or so droid brains. To defend themselves they would have to stop receiving the incoming signals until they were able to stop the implanted bombs. And if enough get through before they activate, that could be anywhere from another five minutes to an hour."

Tobin looked down Chabacaala. "Can you build these bombs?"

The Wookiee grinned and showed a mouthful of fangs.

"Do it," Tobin said.

One week later, the _Destiny_ emerged from hyperspace near the planet of Ryloth—the homeworld of the Twi'leks. Tobin stood by Commander Soonta. Before them they could see a series of orbital platforms, one of which was the desired shipyard. Four imperial frigates and one corvette lazily orbited the planet, all within easy striking range of the platform.

Tobin checked his chronometer. It was time. "Now," Tobin said.

Soonta turned to the communications seat and replaced the ensign there. "Ryloth control, this is the HIMS _Ironclaw_ requesting an emergency refit and repairs. Our drives have been damaged by ion storms and we are losing life support on three decks. Security and authentication codes are transmitting now. "

"Codes confirmed, _Ironclaw_," a Twi'lek in an Imperial uniform said. "You're a long way home."

"We are indeed, Captain," Soontai said. Tobin intentionally made their insignia the same as the Empire's. For all the captain knew, he was speaking to a Commander.

"Acknowledged. Berth Two is clear. Proceed to docking."

The transmission ended. "As soon as we're docked, jam the station," Tobin said. He hit an inter-ship com switch. "Kenth, are your people ready?"

"As ready as this bunch of pirates can be."

Tobin nodded. "I'm on my way down now. Let's go steal a shipyard."

~~Last Jedi~~

~~Last Jedi~~

Only two parsecs away, the Tendrando Type III holonet node received a strong signal. Ninety two nanoseconds after receipt (a lifetime for AIs) the first invading droid personality matrix asserted itself. Its sole purpose for existence was to keep the receiver open for another twenty nanoseconds. In that time, seven hundred additional matrixes were received before the station's droid brains activated a hard defense system that physically blocked the receiver node with a armored plate of reactive trilonium alloy. The twelve Imperial droid brains then began fighting a desperate rear-guard action against the invading matrixes that were even now trying to dominate and destroy the main communications hub for Ryloth, Tattoine and much of the Rim-side of the Corellian Trade Route.

As soon as the signal was sent, the _Ulicia_ returned to hyperspace.

~~Last Jedi~~

~~Last Jedi~~

Lieutenant Halfas stood at a semblance of attention with two troopers to greet the captain of the _Ironclaw_.

He was met by a man in a captain's uniform easily five years the lieutenant's junior, with a squad of troopers behind him. "Lieutenant," the captain said.

The two troopers behind Halfas visible tensed. It was not proper protocol for an incoming captain to be escorted by so many troopers. The Imperial soldiers had only a moment to realize what was happening when a flash of red and blue light spun around either side of the stunned lieutenant, and the troopers fell dead.

Tobin grasped the lieutenant's mind firmly in his power. "Escort me to the command station," he said.

"Yes, sir," Halfas said blankly.

The two dead troopers were pulled quickly inside while Shandor and one of his men fell into step behind Tobin. The rest, all of whom were wearing an infrared mark on their shoulders, began spreading out through the station with Kash in binders. The binders were unlocked, but at first glance looked secured.

In the command center of the Commander Destrial looked up as the captain of the _Ironclaw_ came in with Halfas and his two troopers. "Captain," the commander said, "I'm afraid I'm at a loss. Our initial scans can find no evidence of damage to your ship."

"Whew, I'm glad," Tobin said. He lifted a hand, and with a twist of the force snapped the commander's neck. The two troopers behind Halfas raised their gauntlets before their stunned Imperial counterparts and had two of the loyal troopers down. The other two Tobin killed by throwing both his sabers across the floor.

The sabers obligingly returned to his hands while the dozen other command staffers stared in shock.

"My name is Tobin S'Artin. And I'm afraid I need your shipyard."

"Are you insane?" the station's captain sputtered. "We're surrounded by frigates and defense platforms. The moment this station starts to move, we are all dead."

Tobin shrugged. The man suddenly lifted into the air while grabbing his throat in a desperate attempt to draw breath. "Better to die now, then, isn't it?"

The whole room heard the snap of the captain's neck. "Any other pessimists in the room?"

No one responded. Tobin turned to Shandor. "Kenth, see about the rest of the contingent." He nodded and left the room. Tobin scanned the remaining crewmembers. Humans and Twi'leks, in an even mix.

He stepped down into the command pit itself. A foolish Twi'lek tried to tackle him. Tobin spun around faster than any could follow and cut the man literally in half before continuing on his original path. A pirate trooper remained standing at the door.

"That's what I wanted," he said as he saw the controls. "Initiate a level four bio containment protocol."

The Twi'lek ensign at that post blanched. "Level four? That will lock out the whole station and put everyone on alert."

"I know. Do it now."

The ensign looked down at the three dead bodies in four different heaps and nodded abruptly. This lekku bobbed with the motion. Instantly the whole station began to blare with the alarm.

"Inform the other ships that the _Ironclaw_ was infected with bo'tous spores and that you have already experienced heavy casualties and are spacing the bodies."

The ensign's blue skin turned purple, but he relayed the order. In the meantime, Tobin scanned the controls until he found the life control station. As the ensign predicted, the station completely locked itself down. It was exactly as Kath has predicted. The majority of the troopers were still in their bunker on the station, not even in armor yet, or if they wore armor, they did not have their helmets on.

Modern military installations were all built with the Vong and post-Vong warfare in mind, even after centuries of peace. Where before warfare was a matter of armies shooting at each other, after the Vong invaded the galaxy a whole new component was introduced in modern warfare.

Biological warfare.

It was a terrifying concept, what the Vong and later incarnations of the Sith introduced. In the last war in which the Sith and Jedi fought, the Sith had incorporated Vong biological weaponry in their battles. The casualty rate among the imperial forces and the civilian population was in the hundreds of trillions.

As a result, any installation with significant military populations had failsafe measures to ensure that some could be sacrificed to save the whole. It was a harsh approach, but then again the lessons they learned were harsh indeed. With the push of a button, the walls of bunkers holding almost a hundred and fifty thousand troopers opened.

"My ancestors," the ensign said with a gasp.

"If they're aboard, I'll kill them too," Tobin said.

* * *

sp

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Thank you for reading.


	24. Ryloth, the Second

Chapter 23 Review Responses are in my Last Jedi forum.

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**Chapter Twenty-Four: Ryloth the Second**

The "troopers" with the ancient Wookiee known as Kash led him down the halls, ignoring the blaring alarm. They arrived at the primary prep-station, which was a long hall that ran the length of the starboard docking arm of the primary berth and was literally nothing more than a line of lockers holding the pressure suits for the Wookiee workers. Only one of the three shifts was active—the rest of the Wookiees were in their cells. Covering the shift of fifty thousand workers was the remaining force of Troopers.

The lock-down was overridden from the central command site to allow Kash and his escorts to enter.

The commander on duty looked at the newcomers in confusion. "Trooper, what is going on here? What is this I've heard about bo'tous spores?"

"Sir!" one of Kenth's men, also a former trooper, snapped to attention. "Command ordered us to take this beast here and then evacuate all personnel from this arm. We are sealing off and decontaminating. We are under orders to return to our barracks until further notice."

The commander looked down at the tens of thousands of Wookiees in various states of dress. "If it weren't those damnable spores, I'd protest the waste. But better to lose one shift of workers than all three. Very well." He gave the word and his troopers began to retreat, forming squads with weapons out while the Wookiees looked on in confusion.

The commander was the last to go beside the friendly troopers. "All right, men, it's time to go before these brutes realize what is happening and get violent."

"Of course, sir," the 'trooper'. He then raised his carbine and shot a single red bolt of energy through the startled officer's head.

That got the attention of every Wookiee within sight. The powerful creatures stood up and stared as Kash casually took off his binders and stepped forward. "Brothers and sisters!" he roared in Shyriiwook. His implanted translater allowed the friendly troopers to understand him.

"The time of our freedom approaches! A child of the Jedi has come for us at last!"

The accompanying roar overwhelmed the speakers in the trooper helmets, causing them to automatically mute down the sound.

~~Last Jedi~~

~~Last Jedi~~

In the command center, Tobin nodded in approval as the last of the troopers returned to their barracks. He watched as the majority of them removed their helmets. That was the key as their armor was pressured and capable of withstanding deep space.

To the horror of the cowed Imperial personnel, he overrode the safety switches and vented this next group of troopers just like the first. Even those with helmets on had no time to grab a hold of anything as the enter wall to their compartment opened and sucked them all out.

Tobin could feel their lives going out like flames dipped in water, one after the other after the other. When the deed was done, he turned and viewed the horror-stricken command crew. "Hopefully those will be the last," Tobin told them. He stepped back and viewed the remaining dozen staffers. "I sincerely hope it is not necessary to kill any more of you, but rest assured I will."

The whole station shuddered as the hyperdrive and sublight engines activated. On the _Destiny_, Sor'ai cleared their moorings, closed all hatches, and then completely powered down the ship. With a nod to the others on the bridge, she activated the com. "Ryloth control, we've been infected with bo'tous spores! We have casualties all over the ship. We are powering down and initiating quarantine procedures pending further orders!"

"Acknowledged, _Ironclaw_," came the harried response. "The yard had been infected as well. Power down confirmed. Take no action or you will be fired upon."

"Acknowledged."

She stepped back and hugged her arms to her chest. "Gods or my ancestors, I hope this works," she said to herself. To her bridge staff, the most experienced in Tobin's burgeoning fleet, she said, "Prepare to quick-start all systems and enter jump coordinates for as soon as we clear the planet's gravity well."

Through the viewports, she watched as the station actually pulled away from them. Two of the frigates followed right on the station's heels. They had hoped that would not be the case, but planned on it in any event. Shipyards were expensive pieces of equipment. It was not surprising that the Empire would be unwilling to part with one.

On the station, Tobin handed the Imperial ensign a set of coordinates. "Tell the escorting ships that we are going to these coordinates, and then enter them in our navicomputer as well. When ready, jump."

The terrified ensign did as he was told. It was a short jump of only a minute or two. The station emerged with another shudder, and moments later the two escorting frigates, using their own powerful navicomputers to verify the station actually went where it was supposed to go, also emerged from their jump.

They were met by a nightmare. The _Absolute_ and _Ulicia_ approached from a vertical attack angle almost on top of the first frigate while the space behind the station suddenly came alive with target-locked seismic mines. Megaton level explosions ripped through the hull of both Imperial vessels while Tobin's ships opened fire with everything they had.

The mines were powerful enough to shred the particle shielding arrays of each ship, though the ray shielding continued to soften the rain of turbolaser blasts of the _Absolute_ and _Ulicia_. However, without the particle shielding there was nothing to stop the volley of concussion missiles that the Sestian frigates launched.

Without shields, the two frigates had no hope of surviving and exploded. The first ship shattered down the center, while the second one's hypermatter reactor blew. The resulting explosion enveloped the first ship entirely and left nothing but an atomized cloud.

On the deck, Tobin could not help but sigh. They were outgunned, but with proper planning and a lot of very powerful mines, it was his hope to even the odds. Even so, the risk had been horrific.

"Jump to these coordinates," Tobin ordered the stunned ensign.

The station and two allied ships jumped once more to a neutral spot where he hoped to remove all tracing equipment. This was a long way from being over.

At Ryloth, Sor'ai checked her chronometer. "That's it," she announced. "Quick start all systems. Take a firing solution on that corvette and hit it with everything we have, and then get us out of here top speed."

The quick start procedure powered the ship up in five minutes as opposed to the normal two hour start-up. At first the waiting corvette nearby did not scan the increased heat-bloom from the ship's reactors. However, the frigate on the far horizon of the planet did.

"We're ready," the engineer called.

Sor'ai smiled, then paused as she realized she was firing on people just like she was, just months ago. The smile died. "Fire."

Every turbolaser turret opened on the corvette, which was half the size as the frigate. The corvette's shields failed and it began to list violently toward the planet surface. Immediately the _Destiny_ began accelerating in a tight curve. The distant frigate also began accelerating.

"They have a good angle," the navigator said. "They might catch us."

"Drop the mines," Commander Soonta said. She did not want to have to use them this close to her home world, but she knew it was her only chance of escape.

The _Destiny_ shot out standard decoys, and mixed in were three seismic mines. As they fled the gravity shadow of the planet, the pursuing ship ignored the decoys and plowed directly into the mines.

The devastating seismic shockwaves ripped completely through the prow of the ship and left her tumbling and out of control. Sor'ai stared back at it with pursed lips and a gleam in her eye that could have been a tear.

"Best speed to the rendezvous coordinates."

~~Last Jedi~~

~~Last Jedi~~

Silmari, Tobin and Soonta stood shoulder-to-shoulder and stared into the hangar bay that held the surviving staff of the space station. After a dozen jumps, they paused long enough to transfer a loyal skeleton crew to the station and the Imperials to the _Destiny's_ hangar bay while almost a hundred and fifty thousand Wookiees combed the station looking for Imperial tracking devices. They did not dare return to Dubrillion before the station was clear of such devices.

Six thousand civilian workers, non-coms and Imperial officers sat disconsolately in the center of the bay, guarded by now armed Wookiees and troopers with red stripes on the legs of their armor.

"I don't want to kill them," Tobin said quietly as he looked out over the group of people. He stood between Soonta and Silmari Frahrk.

"If you don't, then it will fall on us to guard them, feed them and care for them while preventing them from giving away our positions," Silmari said. The female Devaronian had her ears laid back in determination. "Killing them would be the most efficient thing to do. It would also delay the Empire from knowing our full strength."

Soonta shook her head. "They're just like I was when you took the _Destiny_," she whispered. "You gave me a chance."

"And I'm glad I did," Tobin admitted with a smile. He could feel her anguish and pain at the thought of killing so many Twi'leks and their human co-workers. "But Silmari does have a point."

"What if they agreed to work with us?" Sor'ai suddenly said. "You filtered out the bad on the _Destiny_. Could you do it down there?"

"An experienced crew would make a different," Silmari admitted. "Even with the Wookiees. These are Imperial-trained engineers and technicians. But it is a terrible risk."

"Tobin, please don't just kill them all," Sor'ai said. "Not non-combatants. Please."

On the other side, Silmari shrugged to indicate she had said her piece.

Tobin finally nodded in decision and turned to walk toward the doors. Kenth was waiting with a hundred soldiers with trooper gauntlets inside. They wore trooper armor without the helmets. Tobin walked by and they fell in behind him as the party emerged into the hangar bay. The imperials and contracted workers jumped to their feet and watched nervously as the troopers spread out in a line before them.

Six thousand people against a hundred sounded like overwhelming odds in favor of the six thousand, but those one hundred troopers could fire a hundred blaster shots a second with deadly accuracy. Plus they kept a distance of twenty meters, more than enough distance to mow down most of the potential attackers.

Tobin stopped a few meters ahead of the troopers. "My name is Tobin S'Artin, and I now own this shipyard. But this brings me to a dilemma. If the Empire finds out where I and my people are, there could be a slaughter. If one of you attempted to relay that information, the Empire could find out. So the simplest solution would be to kill you all."

As the workers cried out in fear and alarm, Tobin nodded to Sor'ai. "Commander Soonta has begged me to allow you to live, provided you agree to work for me. It is only my high regard for the commander that I am even considering this. So I am giving you a choice. Those of you who wish to die for your Emperor and uphold the honor of the Empire, stand over there." He indicated a spot by the closed hangar doors. "Those who are willing to serve me in return for your life and continued well being, sit down on the floor."

The contracted workers, to the last man, sat down. They were mainly Twi'leks and humans. The thousand or so Imperial officers looked around at each other. One man, a captain from his insignia, threw his shoulders back and walked proudly across the floor to stand by the hangar doors. A few other officers did the same. None of the non-coms joined, however. Tobin noticed that the Twi'lek ensign from the command center was already sitting down.

Tobin looked over at the officers. "It's a shame," he finally said aloud. "Men of honor are precious things." There were perhaps two hundred officers out of the thousand Imperials who chose death. It was, frankly, more than Tobin anticipated. He walked across the bay until he faced the first captain to make the walk.

The captain stared back coldly. "You will pay for this indignity."

"Perhaps," Tobin said. "I respect you, Captain. I hope that when I am Emperor, I can find men like you to serve me."

The man's eyes widened just as the thunderstorm of Sith lightning struck him. Everyone in the hangar watched in shock. Sor'ai, who had seen it before, closed her eyes and looked away. Others could not, as a single man killed two hundred officers in a matter of seconds. Some tried to run, only to be yanked violently by invisible hands back into the storm.

In the end, the only sounds were moans of fear from the workers and non-commissioned officers. Tobin walked back across the bay. "Silmari," he said in a hoarse voice, "were the recorders on?"

"They were."

"Make sure everyone sees that," he said. He gently touched Sor'ai's chin and pulled her eyes to his. "I told you once that I don't kill without good reason. We have too many new faces in the organization. They have to know just what I am."

"I've seen your power," she said softly, "and I've seen your compassion. I'm not even sure I know what you are."

Tobin nodded. "When we return," he finally said, "other ships will hopefully become available. When that happens, the _Destiny_ will be yours. You've earned it." With a final nod, he and Silmari turned and walked toward the exit.

Sor'ai delayed a moment to look into the terrified eyes of the men and women before her, before she too nodded and left the bay. She couldn't save those who did not wish to be saved, but she managed to save the rest.

~~Last Jedi~~

~~Last Jedi~~

Sana Fieliel made a muffled whimper when Tobin led her to the observation deck onboard the _Sword of Stars_ to view the shipyard. The feathers she had in lieu of hair stood on end for a moment, before they settled back. She hugged her arms around her own waist and shivered.

"How could you possibly have done this?" she finally asked.

"Planning and a good crew," Tobin said. "Between the Wookiees on Sestia and those we liberated on the station itself, we have almost four hundred thousand Wookiees available. I've heard their colony on Sestia is flourishing."

She shook her head as the reality of the situation came crashing down. "You really want me to prepare a fleet to revolt against the Empire."

"Not the Empire, the Emperor," Tobin clarified.

Upon his return to Sestia, he had picked up his young apprentice to see about his training. Aaris was in the lounge now, looking out over the shipyard with interest. "Sana, look at him."

She did so.

"He is Force-strong," Tobin said. "My apprentice. He would be killed under the Empire. Not because of any crime committed, but solely because of what he is. I was ten when a magistrate came into my class and read a public proclamation condemning me to death. You can't imagine how many children are being slaughtered across the galaxy. I don't care how much blood I have to shed, I will stop that. The Force drives me—I have to stop it, Sana. And this is the only way."

She looked back at the shipyard. "You're really a Fel?"

"I am."

Whatever thoughts were going through her mind made her feathers rise again. "How are you going to staff all these ships?"

"We saved another colony ship from Ulicia," he said. "Another fifty thousand people the Empire threw to the wolves because they believe in the Force. You've seen me use that power, Sana. Can you deny it? Does that make you a Unitarian now?"

She did not answer; nor did he expect her too. "I'll need a senior engineer."

"Kash and Chabacaala are both experienced," he said. "And Commander Sor'ai Soonta is working with those station personnel who chose to stay. I can't say they're happy, any more than you, but I promise that like you I will treat them fairly. It's likely they will have staff you can use."

Sana turned noticed the _Ulicia_ covering near the shipyard. "It's going to take a week of hard labor just to raise a ship," she said.

"In the meantime, Dekarta has already started work on _Sword of Stars_."

"He may be a toad, but he's good with guns," she said grudgingly.

"And if this ever blows up in my face," Tobin said, "you can say you were held under duress and tortured until you cooperated."

"Nice."

"Master!" Aaris chimed.

The two looked over and Fieliel gasped as the boy levitated a ball.

"Very good, my apprentice," Tobin said. He turned back to Fieliel.

"Okay," she said.

~~Last Jedi~~

~~Last Jedi~~

Fieliel beat her prediction by three days. As it turned out, the Wookiees that arrived with the station knew of a lifting cradle and a skyhook already stored within one of the secondary berths for just such an occasion as lifting a grounded ship. With the help of an army of Wookiees in pressure suits that could withstand the lethal conditions of Dubrillion, they managed a lifting cradle for a _Scythe-_class Alliance heavy cruiser once called the _Ackbar_. Tobin cheered right along with the others as the cradle—composed of millions of micro-carbon fibers interwoven into a net and held by ten massive repulsor coils—rose from the surface and into orbit along a laser guide.

They used one of the smaller transport ships as a tug which, in addition to the tractor beams, situated the cruiser into one of the berths. The other berth was filled with the massive _Sword of_ _Stars_. While Fieliel worked on lifting the first ship, the Gungan Dekarta already started work on the former Ithorian pleasure liner. The first thing he did was remove the massive transparisteel dome in the center of the ship, and the five levels below it.

"I'm going to miss that swimming pool," Shandor quipped while he and Tobin toured the ship. Most of the ship was taken up by luxury suites that Dekarta was also ripping out. Instead he was installing starfighter bays and secondary power generators for banks and banks of heavy turbolaser cannons and smaller anti-starfighter laser cannons. The ship already had a significant hyper-matter reactor.

Dekarta stole another reactor from the corpse of an old _Imperial-_II class star destroyer on Dubrillion and installed it in the heart of the ship directly underneath where the dome used to be.

Tobin tried following the Gungan's schematics, but finally had to admit it was beyond him. And so he finally hunted the weapons expert down to ask what he was doing.

Dekarta's hands flew about as he spoke. "I'm building you a big booming gun, that's what!" he said, falling back momentarily to his Gungan roots.

"Can you be a little more specific?"

"Do you know how old superlaser technology is?" the Gungan asked. "There were superlasers blowing up planets five hundred years ago almost. It's old technology, but the Empire doesn't use it."

"Because it's illegal," Shandor pointed out.

"You're pirates, why do you care?" the Gungan said. "I'm building a level II superlaser. It won't blow up a planet, but it will penetrate most planetary shields in a single shot. All shields in two. And it will take out any ship it fires on. If I'm going to slave away for you, I might as well make something I've always wanted to but wasn't allowed."

"I sense there's a limitation to this laser," Tobin said.

"Power. It will exhaust the secondary hypermatter reactor in twenty shots and be useless until the hypermatter is refilled. I'm not even going to plug it into the ship's primary reactor since that could leave the ship dead in space. Also the capacitors will have a slow recharge cycle. A full eighty-five seconds between shots. In battle that can be dangerous. Once it fires, this ship will be the primary target of any enemy ship in the area."

Kenth whistled in appreciation.

"When will she be battle-worthy?" Tobin asked as he and Dekarta walked through the drastically changed ship.

"She can fight now," the Gungan said with a casually clumsy waive of his hand. "But she would lose. To win, another month. The liner has military grade shielding, but was not wired for anything more than a few laser cannon mounts. But she has the power grading for much more. She'll make the old Mon Calamari cruisers seem tame when I'm done with her. She will have the power of the old _Eclipse_-class ships but only be a fraction of the size."

"Excellent," was all Tobin could think to say.

His plans were finally beginning to take shape.

* * *

sp

Thank you for reading!


	25. An Old Enemy, A New Friend

**Chapter Twenty-Five: An Old Enemy, a New Friend**

It soon became obvious that Tobin was simply…in the way. He knew that he was the leader—the catalyst of everything happening. But he was not an engineer or a technician, at least not formally. He could repair a ship with the best of them, but with so many professionals handling the details, he realized his best course of action was to simply get out of their way.

And so he returned to Sestia with Aaris at his side, and discovered to his delight that Sula Santari and the rest of the colonists had built him a home. Not just a home, but what by the standards of the colony was a palatial manor on the edge of the plateau overlooking the tidal plains below.

The home featured a large office with a sophisticated communications suite purchased by Afton Shief on the Rings for this very reason.

After thanking the colonists for the gift, he immediately set to work.

The Sestia Shipping Line was a fact, at least in so far as the Empire was concerned. The office on Coruscant was established and the lease paid for a year in advance. There were even inquiries starting to come in regarding fees and duties.

He made a long conference call with his barrister, Amarooni Andal, regarding fees and services. He had six transport ships, but wished to only dedicate four of them to the line. He couldn't risk using the massive slave transport since it was an obvious target and would alert authorities.

After sending out inquiries among his inner circle, he was surprised when Vilmarn Frark of all people shot back an instant response giving detailed expense reports from the _Fool's Prize_. Tobin stared at the name of the ship for a moment, trying to remember which one in his growing fleet it was, until he remembered. And when he remembered, he almost kicked himself for forgetting. How could he forget?

He had to stand and leave the office for a moment to calm himself. Aaris was with Shindo and his wife for the day, but called on the com. "Master, you okay?" the boy asked.

He felt Tobin's surge of emotion from across the colony. "Fine, Aaris. What are you doing to day?"

The boy sighed. "School. Mama Soola has started a school with two other teachers. I feel kind of stupid—most of the other kids got imprinted. But Mama Soola says I'm doing good all things considered."

"You want to know a secret, Aaris?"

"Sure."

"I was never imprinted either. Force-strong children don't accept the imprinting process well. So don't worry—you'll catch up and do fine. Please let Mama Soola know I will be training you tomorrow."

"Okay. See you, master."

"Be well, Aaris."

Tobin wondered if taking a more Jedi-like approach with Aaris was proper. Though his own training at the hands of the Sith was harsh and unforgiving, he just did not want to torture the boy. Not like that.

He dismissed the confusion about what to do and got back to work.

By the end of the day, he had appointed Vilmarn as the manager of the shipping line. While Silmari was a ruthless tactician in battle, her normally docile husband was an acute and ruthless business man. In the days to come he would set up an established Core trading route with the four transports using captains and crews taken from the Ulician colony and Kenth's people from the Temple on the Rings.

Within a month he would actually hire on five more captains who were willing to give up their independence for a steady paycheck and guaranteed routes that only an established, licensed shipping firm could provide.

Tobin leaned back after working all day and stepped out onto the pre-fab porch. The sun was already setting over the distant Western range, throwing the tidal plain at the base of the plateau below into a mottled platform of orange and yellow light.

This world was a true gift of the Force. He wanted so very much to share it with Klinti that for one brief moment he turned to say something to her, before the moment passed. The brief smile faded and he turned to look back out onto the plain.

He felt Sor'ai Soonta's presence well before she cleared her throat. He turned and saw future captain of the _Destiny_ standing in his living room nervously, holding a tray. "I thought you might be hungry," she said with a nervous smile.

With the smell of food came realization that he had not eaten all day. "I am, thank you," he said. "Join me?'

She stepped outside with him and the two sat at the small porch table as the sun continued its gradual decline. They ate in silence, but through the Force Tobin could feel nervousness from his guest, and more.

He felt desire.

The realization came as a shock, though he covered it as best he could and continued to eat silently. It was a basic meal, of a grainy bread and long-neck steak with boiled vegetables, all coated in a thick brown sauce.

Sor'ai was a beautiful woman, as almost all young Twi'leks were. There was a reason why Twi'lek women had been desired as slaves through the millennia. He had never seen an unattractive female from that species, at least not by human terms. Sor'ai was no different. Her blue skin was soft and unblemished, her eyes a deep, watery aquamarine set in a face with classically beautiful features. Her lekku were cupped in gold clasps, giving the illusion they were braids rather than fleshy extensions of her actual brain. Like all of her kind the body under her uniform was lush and ripe, beautiful by any estimation.

Knowing what he did, he felt his body responding even as his mind flailed about hopelessly.

The meal was over and Sor'ai quietly gathered the plates. She was, he realized, assuming the traditionally subservient female role in a Twi'lek relationship. He had read in her file that there was both a genetic component to such subservience, combined with a lifetime of conditioning. Yet another reason so many Twi'lek females were sold into slavery.

"Sor'ai…"

"Others have seen how lonely you are," she said as she came to stand before him.

"I have a hard destiny," Tobin said. "But I won't be alone forever. I have foreseen the one I must marry in order to stop the slaughter.'

"Is she beautiful?"

"Yes."

"Will she love you?"

Tobin sighed. "That I cannot say. The Force shows me what I must do. It does not show me if there will be love in my life."

The Twi'lek woman very deliberately pulled down the clasp of her uniform, revealing beautiful, pale blue skin and nothing else.

"I will love you for tonight," she said. "Your destiny can have the rest."

"Sor'ai, I ca…."

His protest was cut off by a soft kiss and the feel of her body pressing against him. Her arms reached around and pulled him into the kiss, and his already weakened will crumbled. When at last they parted, he whispered, "Why?"

"Would your love wish you to suffer so?" Sor'ai asked.

He knew she was not speaking of his future, but of his past. "I don't know," he admitted with more emotion than he knew how to handle.

"If she loved you, then she would want you to be happy," Sor'ai said. "I do." She slowly unclasped his own uniform, and he found he could not resist.

~~Last Jedi~~

~~Last Jedi~~

Tobin was alone when he woke the next morning. He sat up as the first light of the morning seeped in through the blinds, and simply sat staring into the wall, while inside his mind replayed the events of the evening.

Sor'ai was very good. Their love play was gentle and kind and everything Tobin could have hoped for. But her one failing was that she was not Klinti. Eventually he folded his legs up underneath him and meditated, but the Force provided no answers.

After a quick shower, he dressed in loose training clothes obtained from the Rings many weeks prior, and sought out the home Shindo Bard and Soola Dayaala had made together on the surface, when Shindo was not in space.

He found the odd family awake and eating breakfast. Aaris looked up with a grin at his foster parents. "See," he said. "Told you he was coming."

Soola smiled lovingly at the boy before she turned and bowed. "He told us you were coming, Force-blessed. The Force is truly with him."

"It is indeed," Tobin said. "Did you sleep well?"

"Did you?" Shindo asked. Though many Sect members still treated Tobin with reverence, Shindo had also served with him on a pirate ship, and so was willing to speak more bluntly than many.

He was, Tobin knew, referring to Sor'ai. The young Force-adept wondered just how many people were aware of it. "I slept peacefully, thank you," he said.

Shindo nodded in satisfaction. "Good. Sometimes even masters of the Force need a good night. Would you join us? One of the other colonists discovered a local avian that lays eggs that are not just edible, but delicious."

"Yes, that would be nice."

So Tobin joined his apprentice's foster family for a morning meal, while Aaris chatted away about school and what he was learning. It was the closest thing to family Tobin had experienced since his mother's death. Even then, his morning meals with her did not feel this free and easy.

He was glad Aaris had this environment.

After breakfast, Tobin and Aaris meditated in the plains outside the city proper while Aaris's foster parents went bout their individual jobs. Shindo was actually attending a training session with his adult children that Sor'ai was holding for all ship personnel on how to actually do their jobs. The future captain was well trained by the academy and from all reports was doing a spectacular job.

"Some of the kids at school don't like me," Aaris said mid-way through their meditation session. "One boy tried to even beat me up."

"What did you do?"

Aaris grinned. "Put him on the ground, of course. Mama Soola said I wasn't supposed to fight, but I could feel he was going to try and hit me from behind. I let him swing first."

"You're in a difficult position," Tobin said. "In days of old, Jedi were segregated from the rest of the galaxy at a young age to be trained. Obviously I can't do that. When you are older, I will take you as my apprentice full time. But until then, I need you to study and learn as much as you can. And if the Force tells you about a pending attack, deal with it."

"You mean kill 'em?" Aaris asked. His upbringing showed in the absence of emotion regarding the question.

"No. There will be a time, Aaris, when I may ask you to kill. But not yet, and not these people. I am their leader and they are my people. It is our duty to protect them, not harm them. Leadership is a fine line. I treat them well, and they allow me to be their leader. If I treat them poorly, they may start leaving, and if the Empire ever learns about this world, all is lost."

Aaris nodded with a wisdom beyond his years. "Master Leia says that Jedi should let go their anger and fear."

"The Sith say otherwise," Tobin said. "It is a difficult line to balance one. For untold thousands of years, the Jedi and Sith fought each other because of their differences, until the Empire banned both sides and attempted to wipe the Force from the galaxy. We two are building a new line of Force-users. One that takes the best of both sides. Harness your emotions, Aaris. They can give you strength far beyond what the Jedi possessed. Love, anger. The Jedi of old forbid attachment, while the Jedi of new learned from the Sith that this was a fallacy. Love, hate. But at the same time never let your emotions control your judgment."

"I'm not really going to be a Jedi, then, am I?"

"No, not like Master Leia," Tobin said. "Nor will you be Sith. My mother was the last true Jedi. Darth Valus was the last true Sith Lord. You and I will be something new. I don't know what to call our new Order yet, but it will be an Order unlike anything seen since the split of the first Jedi."

Aaris nodded. "Master? Thank you. For saving me, I mean. For giving me a home and the Force."

Tobin smiled fondly at the boy. "You are very welcome, my apprentice. Now, let's run." Like any child, Aaris groaned. However, soon the two were running around the new colony.

It was more than exercise for Tobin—it was a way to observe the progress of the colony. The food crops were already well on their way to producing the first edible grains and vegetables. The stock animals were still too young, but the local megafauna was filling the gap for the Wookiees and humans. What impressed Tobin was the infrastructure already in place.

He tried to think and realized the colony was now six months old. In just six months, they had a real city, and it was not the only one. The second colony ship they saved had already landed in their secondary site and was, according to Sana, flourishing.

He left the colony behind and led Aaris on a wild run through the grass land. On several occasions he slowed. "Reach out with your senses, Aaris," he said. "What do you feel?"

"A club hopper!" Aaris said after a moment of concentration. The club hopper was a massive hunter with a clubbed tail and a set of lethally sharp claws. It was easily the size of any two speeders and could snap an adult in half.

"Is it after us?"

"No, I think it's hunting a humped grazer nearby."

"Then we'll wait for it to move on."

"Couldn't you kill it?" Aaris asked.

"I could," Tobin agreed.

"Why don't you?"

"Because every life has value, a price. To kill without reason squanders the price you have to pay."

"But you've killed!"

"Yes, and I've paid the price for each life," Tobin said somberly.

In his months of on-again, off-again training, Aaris had learned to sense something of his master's mood and simply nodded. "Okay."

The humped grazer was a juvenile that had gone too far from the herd. It was still twice the size of the already huge club hopper, but when the predator attacked, swinging the heavy clubbed tale around to shatter the herbivore's front leg, it was assured of a good meal.

They continued on after that, running with the Force flowing through them until they reached the temperate forests that bordered the edge of the plateau and the mountains nearby. The forest had already been remade by the huge influx of Wookiees, sporting a network of wooden trails through the branches of the tall trees. They were a strange mixture of coniferous and deciduous trees with leaves on the upper branches and spines on the lower branches to ward off the huge animals. This in turn seemed to lead to the development of a species of herbivore with a hugely elongated neck and a small head comprised of two small, beady eyes and one big mouth.

This was the animal that the Wookiees decided was their favorite, since the neck meat was particularly succulent and the animals bred like mad.

Although they were not expected, sharp Wookiee eyes saw the two approaching long before they arrived and they were greeted with happy roars from most of the Wookiees there. Unlike most of the adults in the colony that were raised by Imperial propaganda to fear the Wookiees, Aaris loved his time there. With Tobin's blessing the young boy scampered up the nearest tree and started visiting with his many new friends.

The adult Wookiees, perhaps lamenting the lack of children, welcomed him happily. Tobin himself was looking for Kash, and found the elder in a large platform on the tallest tree in the new Wookiee city. He was surrounded by a ring of older Wookiee workers and was eating a meal of meat and grain from the colony they had traded for meat.

"Welcome, Jedi son!" Kash said as Tobin arrived. He greeted Kash and his hastily assembled Elder council by name before sitting. He felt dwarfed among the huge creatures, but not threatened.

"Your people thrive here," he said.

"As well as we can," Kash agreed. "The meat is plentiful, but the trees are small. We have been discussing this. We believe we have thrown this planet out of balance. For us to live, we must kill too many of the long-necks for them to survive. When they die, the human colonies will not make enough to feed us. While this is a good world, we feel it is not sufficient for us long term."

This was new to Tobin, and he had to fight down a surge of panic. "Have you thought of any other place you could live?"

"Before we discuss that, we meant to ask if you would help us."

"Of course," Tobin said. "Your people are even now building ships for me. I owe you for that, if for no other reason. I and my people will help however we can."

"We wish to live on Dubrillion."

Tobin managed to shut his jaw. "Dubrillion is a dead world."

"Yes. It is perfect. If you wish to help us, you will find a world shaper, and you will remake Dubrillion into another Kashyyyk for us."

Tobin leaned forward, intrigued. "I do not doubt you, for you have seen much more than I. But who are world shapers?"

"The Vong," Kash said. "In the last days of the Alliance, the Jedi worked with the Vong to restore dead worlds. It worked, but the Sith poisoned their efforts to lead to war. Find a Vong to shape Dubrillion into a new Kashyyyk, and that will be our world."

The young Force-adept considered the request. Totally aside from the fact that no one wanted four hundred thousand cranky Wookiees, a habitable Dubrillion would make all their jobs easier. He just wasn't sure it was doable even by the Sekotan Vong.

"I will seek the Vong out," he finally said, "and ask if this can be done. If it is possible, then for you and your people I will do this, and then aid Taryn in transporting you. I give you my word."

Kash and the others roared their approval. "Then the promise is made, Jedi son," Kash said with a series of jubilant snuffles.

~~Last Jedi~~

~~Last Jedi~~

A week later, Tobin returned to Dubrillion by himself, giving Aaris some school time the boy needed so badly. He found a hive of activity. When his shuttle reverted to real space, he saw a new ship in third berth of the shipyard. Not just any ship, but the massive form of a _Pelleaon_-class star destroyer much like the one he and his mother fled to before the Zabrak betrayed them.

This ship was in awful shape, having been abandoned long ago, but he knew if Fieliel dedicated the resources to bringing it up from the surface, then the ship was salvageable. He did several close flybys of the shipyard, observing the progress.

The _Sword of Stars_ was completely different, bristling now with armaments and a single turret gun almost the size of a sloop rising from the black cylinder that now dominated the center of the ship.

The _Ackbar_ was the most impressive. The exterior hull appeared completely new, though Tobin knew that in fact the armor plating had simply been cleaned and coated with protective polymer common to all modern ships. The material provided additional shielding against most radiations so common in space. The ship looked truly intimidating now.

Fieliel had staff working on the surface from the old Dubrillion Aquarium building, while Deskarta commanded the progress from the shipyard. Tobin was also surprised to see a large orbital platform a few hundred thousand klicks away which looked like a series of three hundred meter long, on hundred meter in diameter cylindrical tanks.

When he finally arrived, Fieliel advised him on the progress. "The _Ackbar_ is almost done," she said. "The ship was in surprisingly good shape on the inside. All weapons and navigation systems were intact, and frankly ship technology hasn't advanced at all since that era, so the systems are perfectly comparable to the modern Imperial navy. The main damage was a leaking hypermatter reactor and the hull. You can see we got the hull rectified, and I was able to have the reactor repaired. The old Alliance ships were designed with quick repair times in mind. With a replacement of two thruster arrays, she'll be ready for her shakedown cruise."

Tobin did not try to hide his eager smile. "Incredible. And the other?"

"_Pellaeon_-class, as I'm sure you saw. The exterior is a little worse off, but like the Alliance ship the interior systems were well maintained. Also, it is a newer ship; decommissioned only a century or so ago. Like the _Ackbar_ we've reinforced the ship's hull with bonding polymers to renew and eliminate metal fatigue. Once we're able to get the hull plating repaired, I suspect she'll be ready to go as well. And Deskarta is just about done with the _Sword of Stars_. She's due to begin her shakedown cruise as soon as she has a crew and a captain."

Tobin was already thinking about who would comprise the crews, and who would captain them. "Master Fieliel, you have done incredible work here. What next?"

"Another _Scythe-_class, and a couple of more modern frigates that I think could be recovered with a minimum of fuss."

"Excellent. Thank you, and please let me know if there is anything you or Deskarta need."

"Where will you be?"

"In about a week, I'll be on the Rings talking to old enemies I hope to make into new friends."

~~Last Jedi~~

~~Last Jedi~~

Moff Dila Hershied wondered briefly how long she would be able to call herself a moff as Grand Moff Shol Dinteri's personal shuttle landed outside her administrative complex. The Grand Moff's frigate and corvette escorts floated in a low orbit, while the assault shuttle carrying Dinteri and his escort came down.

Hershied adjusted her collar, patted a strand of hair in place, and snapped to attention as the shuttle's ramp opened. All around, her officer corps snapped to attention as well.

Like Hershied, Dinteri was old-school Empire. From a family of moffs and admirals, the Grand Moff was destined for his office the moment he graduated from the Bastion Academy at the top of his class. He was a tall man, over two meters, with thick black hair frosted with gray and penetrating eyes.

The eyes at once made Hershied wonder why she never tried to sleep with him, and realize simultaneously that to do so would be the end of her career. This man was not a toy, and was notoriously dedicated to his wife and three children.

"Dila," he said. Moff's did not salute, since technically they were civilian governors. Rather, he offered his hand and she took it with a warm smile on her face.

"Shol," she said, sincerely, "it is good to see you again. I've prepared refreshments for you if you would like."

"Thank you," Dinteri said. His terse reply was a clear indicating there would be no pleasantries. It made things more nervous for her because, outside their offices, they were both good, long-time friends. She knew his wife and children by name.

Once they retreated to the safety and privacy of her office, Dila closed and sealed her door, and led the grand moff not to her desk, but to a worktable in an adjoining alcove. "I take it you came because of Sir Reindel?"

Dinteri shook his head. Without preamble, he said, "Sir Reindel? By the Throne, Dila, that is just the tip of it. What is happening out here? We're getting wild reports of super-powered abnormal pirates. I'm not even sure what Reindel told the Emperor. But I do know that I have the head of Kashyyyk Control screaming for someone's blood. Admiral Nitazzin is, to put it mildly, livid over the loss not just of a quarter of a million Wookiees, but the escorting frigate as well. Then to top it all off, someone in one of your frigates managed to steal an entire Type X shipyard right out from our noses while attacking and interfering with a holonet relay node. We lost three hundred thousand troopers and several thousand more workers, not to mention the Wookiees on board. What in the Emperor's name is going on?"

Hershied went perfectly still. "A shipyard? Wookiees missing?"

"Missing. Almost two hundred and fifty thousand stinking Wookiees stolen in their transports, and that's not even counting the crew of the stolen shipyard. How does a pirate steal that many Wookiees? How does anyone steal a shipyard? The Moff of the Gaulus Sector has already been dismissed and may likely lose his head. What is going on, Dila?"

Hershied went through her options. She was a politician, of course, but she was before that a loyal member of the Empire. She was also, as the saying went, caught. She did not doubt for an instant that a lie would come back and forcefully bite her. So she did not lie.

"Several years ago an Abnormal woman and her son fell in with one of my pet pirates. They had a falling out and the pirates turned her in to me. She and her son escaped to Korriban. So I sent two frigates to join this pirate ship in wiping her out. We killed a female and male, but only after the pirate lost two hundred men, and we lost close to a hundred."

Dinteri stared at her with a gaping jaw. "You lost combined three hundred men to two abnormals?"

"They were trained," Dila said. "The woman claimed to be a Jedi knight. She had a laser sword, and evidently she knew how to use it. But we got them, or so I thought. Just in the past few months though I started receiving word that the boy somehow survived, and that the male we killed on Korriban was another abnormal entirely. This boy may have single-handedly taken one of my frigates. The ship has committed several acts of piracy since then."

The grand moff reared back as if struck. "He took a frigate single-handedly?"

"He later killed two hundred troopers, also single-handedly, while taking an Ithorian luxury liner," Hershied said.

"And what are you doing in response?"

She quickly laid out their plans. So far, they had stopped two minor piracy attempts but had nothing on Tobin S'Artin. "I briefly considered attacking the Rings, but my admiral assured me the losses would be significant. I did not know about the theft of the Wookiees, however. I was debating bringing this to your attention, but frankly I was hoping to contain and deal with it myself."

"As well you should," Dinteri said with a shake of his head. "I don't fault anything you've done, Dila. You're actually one of the jewels in this oversector. But you must understand the Emperor has taken a personal interest in this because of Sir Reindel and he is not pleased."

"I could take the Rings," Hershied said. "That would remove his base of support and turn the other pirates against him. But I hesitated to risk a full third of my fleet without your consent."

"You have that consent," Dinteri said without hesitation. "And an additional task force of fifty ships and as many troops as you require. They've had their place in the past, but the pirate problem has to go away, at least for a while. And most importantly, this Tobin S'Artin must go away with it."

"I understand, Shol," Moff Hershied said. "It will take a week or so to mobilize, but we'll get it done, one way or the other."


	26. The Battle of the Rings

I am terribly sorry, but there will be no review responses for Chapter 25. This has continued to be an incredibly difficult and hectic week, and I barely have time to get this post up. Next weekend should be better.

Thank you all for reading and reviewing!

* * *

**Chapter Twenty-Six: The Battle of the Rings**

Ashala Dezcartri kept her face hidden behind the deep cowl of her robe, and her hands covered in the sleeves. Behind her stood two body-guards covered in featureless black armor and masked helmets. At a casual glance, none would know what race she was. Her voice was low and smooth, though her Basic was clipped and oddly accented. "What you ask is difficult."

"You have done it before," Tobin pointed out.

"I have not, nor have any of my kind in centuries," Dezcartri said. "The last time we did such a thing, war erupted."

"This is one world, and has already been abandoned by the Empire," Tobin said. "It is a dead world because of Imperial pollution and one battle too many. But you could make it live again."

"What would be in this transaction for my people? The shaping of a dead world is not an easy matter to accomplish. The acquisition of a proper dhuryam alone is prohibitive, not to mention highly illegal."

"We're on a pirate base," Tobin pointed out. "Legality is not an issue. Compensation is our only point of discussion. What is it that you want?"

Dezcartri leaned forward until Tobin could see the blue sacs under her eyes, the almost skeletal slit of her nose, and the intricate tattoos covering her face. Although the Sekotan Vong did not scar themselves as their Yuuzhan Vong ancestors did, they did still practiced ritual tattooing.

"We want our freedom! It has been centuries, and yet we are still confined to our one world. We are publicly shamed and humiliated if we dare leave, and often times killed. We have obeyed the terms of our treaty. We have grown no weapons or attacked others in centuries. There are hundreds of dead worlds we could save, but our offers are spurned. We are still treated as traitors for something our long-dead ancestors did!"

Tobin knew from his Jedi Holocron that the original Yuuzhan Vong existed outside the Force. The Sekotan Vong were very much a part of it, and with the Force Tobin could feel Dezcartri's desperation and anger.

"Our goals closely align," Tobin said. "We could help each other."

Dezcartri sniffed. With the particular shape of her nose, the sound came out faintly like a Gamorrean squeal. "You are but a single pirate. Yes, I have heard your name, but you are no match for the Empire."

"It is difficult to know what the future brings," Tobin said. "For the help with this one world, and more dovin basils for interdictions, you would gain a potentially powerful ally who can pay in hard credits. All you can gain from the Empire is contempt."

Dezcartri was about to speak when Tobin stalled her with his up-raised hand. He looked up and around at the restaurant on the 522 level of the first ring of the massive pirate base.

"What is it?" The Sekotan Vong said.

"Danger," Tobin said. "The Force is warning me of terrible danger." He stood and motioned for her to follow. "You came in a smuggler ship?"

"We are required to fly on those dead things," Dezcartri said with contempt.

"I'll get you and your people out on my ship," Tobin said. "But we need to go, now."

Suddenly the sunlight strip overhead began flashing red. Speakers began blaring an alarm. "What is happening?" Dezcartri demanded as she and her guards ran with Tobin.

"The base is under attack," Tobin said. He turned and grinned at her. "Probably because of me. My ship is docked nearby. Come!"

Around them people screamed in terror. Tobin watched as parents tried to grab their children; he saw angrily that many children were simply abandoned and left screaming for their loved ones. The Jedi in him wanted to stop and help them, while the Sith in him wanted to hunt down and murder their parents.

The pirate in him simply continued running, since any pause to help them would undo everything he had worked for. Everything Klinti had died for.

Suddenly the terrace in front of them exploded inward, throwing beings screaming over the edge where they began the long fall down into the base of the first ring. The explosion was not caused by a turbolaser blast, but by the cone of a boarding ship. The reinforced tip of the cone exploded out across the ring valley and crashed into a store front on the other side. Instantly, troopers poured out with their blasters gauntlets firing.

Behind them, one of Dezcartri body guards took a blaster bolt in the chest. His vonduun crab armor, bred into a more mundane appearance, could easily have staved off a blaster bolt from the time of the Yuuzhan Vong war. The new Imperial trooper blaster gauntlets were more powerful than any hand held weapon from that era and punched through the living armor with brute force.

Tobin grabbed the Master Shaper and pulled her down just as a pair of rapid-fire bolts took down her other guard. "So much for your goals," she said. Her hood had fallen to reveal her coarse black hair.

"Not quite," Tobin said. He wrapped his arms around her in a tight embrace, and then rolled toward the edge of the terrace. The safety rails were long since destroyed in the assault.

"What are you doing?" Dezcartri demanded, just as the two of them rolled into the vast emptiness of the valley and began falling.

She did not notice the length of cable that swung toward them from the shattered edge of the terrace. Tobin grabbed the cable with one hand and strengthened his grip with the Force even as he held the Sekotan Vong shaper closer.

Her belief system did not allow outward signs of fear. So she did not scream. However, her terror rolled over her as their fall ended in a parabolic swing underneath the cone of the boarding ship. Underneath them the valley fell far below.

Tobin pushed backward with the Force to give them enough momentum to clear the edge of the next platform down. He let go of Dezcartri and sent her sprawling onto the ferocrete terrace as he pulled one of his lightsabers.

Two troopers were trying to figure out where the Sekotan Vong came from when their helmet sensors detected a snap-hiss from behind. The turned just in time to catch a flicker of red before their heads fell from their bodies.

Tobin turned as dozens more troopers continued to pour from yet another of the boarding ship. Tobin Force-pushed the front line of soldiers back, and then grasped the ship itself with his power and pulled. The wall and the ship itself groaned as it suddenly surged forward far enough that the troop opening was directly over the valley. It only took two troopers rushing out to their deaths for the others to realize they had to use the smaller rear hatch to disembark.

Tobin turned, grabbed Dezcartri's arm, and ran. Behind him, the volunteer security forces of the Rings began to fight back against the boarding party. All around, they could see other such cones jutting out from behind business. It was more than a raiding party, it was an out-right invasion.

"Good thing I moved my money," Tobin muttered.

"Where is your ship?"

"Four levels down and across the valley."

"Across?" Dezcartri asked.

~~Last Jedi~~

~~Last Jedi~~

"She betrayed us," Aleusa snarled in rage.

Beside her, the Zabrak ignored the comment and continued yelling orders to the controllers. "I don't care; pull the damn docking rings loose. We're taking fire!" He finally looked at his partner. "Guess it was only a matter of time. I knew bringing the whole ship here was a mistake."

"It's all S'Artin's fault!" Aleusa said. "First he steals Klinti, and then he seals all our fates with his treason!"

The whole ship jerked as they ripped free of their moorings. It was a rare thing for the ship to actually arrive at the rings in person, but the transfer of hypermatter was not something that could be done by shuttles. Even the mighty star destroyer needed fuel.

Behind them, other desperate pirate and free trade ships were engaging a fleet of almost eight hundred hundred Imperial frigates and corvettes. Space glinted with multitudinous flecks of thousands of fighters engaging each other. Neither the Zabrak nor Aleusa had any illusions that their Uglies and outdated equipment could stand up to a coordinated Imperial assault—especially not an assault as overwhelming as this.

"Do we run or surrender?" Zabrak finally asked.

"We run," Aleusa said. "If she betrayed us once, she'll do it again."

~~Last Jedi~~

~~Last Jedi~~

Admiral Gest'aka bowed as Moff Hershied stepped onto the bridge of his command ship, the frigate _Iron First_. "The invasion is proceeding. We have landed ten thousand troops so far. Resistance is stiffening. However, we have only lost three ships so far. We do have preliminary reports that S'Artin may personally be on that station."

Hershied took her seat and worked hard to hide her anticipation. "Admiral, order all our men to retreat."

"Moff Hershied?" Admiral Gest'aka asked. His large amphibian eyes blinked repeatedly in surprise.

"If he is on that station, then the only way to destroy him is to destroy the station. We cannot give him any opportunity to escape. You've read the report of what happened at Korriban."

"There are over ten million beings on that station," Gest'aka pointed out.

Hershied took a deep, steadying breath and nodded. "And they are all pirates living beyond the protection of Imperial law. Destroy the station, and any ships attempting to escape it."

~~Last Jedi~~

~~Last Jedi~~

Tobin grabbed Dezcartri and pulled both back down as a party of Rings volunteers engaged a squad of troopers. Red and green blaster bolts surged over their heads.

"I do not believe I have ever had a human take such liberties with my body ever before," Dezcartri said. He could hear indignity, and even a spark of humor, behind her fear.

"I humbly beg your pardon," Tobin said dryly. "I assure you my intentions are entirely honorable."

Dezcartri snorted again. "Indeed. How do we get out of this?"

Tobin pointed over the edge of the terrace. Directly below them, a shuttle tube ran across the valley. A car was stuck in the center of the tube. "They aren't working," Dezcartri pointed out.

"We're not going in a car." With his saber, Tobin cut the safety rail away. He then took the Sekotan Vong's hand and the two hopped off the edge of the terrace.

They fell three stories but barely had to bend their knees when they landed. "Your Force again?" she asked.

"I want you to build a new world for me," he said. "I figure the least I can do is keep you from breaking your legs."

Fortunately the tube was wide enough to allow them a safe crossing. Heavier blaster bolts began to crisscross the valley, when suddenly, all firing ceased.

"What is happening?" Dezcartri asked.

Tobin touched the Force and felt an overwhelming sensation of danger. It took a moment longer for realization to hit. "They're going to destroy the station," he whispered, stunned. He dipped further into the Force and yelled. His voice exploded across the station like a loudspeaker. "The Imperials are going to destroy the station! Everyone evacuate!"

He looked and saw Dezcartri on her knees with her hands over her ears. "How can you do that?"

"I caused the air to reverberate and augment my voice," Tobin said. He used one of his sabers to cut a hole in the tube beyond the defunct car, and the two dropped in. "We have to get to my ship immediately."

As the first boarding ship pulled out, the suddenly open hole began pulling at the atmosphere in the station. This created a whistling wind. Tobin cut his way out of the tube toward the landing bay when a second, third and then forth ship pulled out. The wind picked up.

Soon, the ships began withdrawing by the dozens, and the wind became a hurricane. "We have to hurry!" Tobin said over the sound. He knew that eventually emergency bulkheads would close of the breaches, but the sheer numbers insured that there would be significant loss of atmosphere. Of course, the fact that the Imperial fleet was planning on destroying the whole station would also lead to a significant loss of atmosphere.

They ran hand-in-hand through the terrified crowds until they reached Tobin's docking bay. There were perhaps twenty other shuttles, and in front of every one teemed a crowd of terrified people. Hundreds, even thousands, of people.

"Okay, that's going to be a problem," Tobin muttered.

"What are we going to do?"

"I have a slave control for my ship," Tobin said. His ship was a modified Ithorian shuttle their captured liner used to ferry tourists to site-seeing visits on planets. It was easily large enough to hold a hundred or more people. Hence his ship had the largest crowd trying to break through the unbreakable hatch seal.

Behind them, the bay hatch slammed shut against the continued loss of atmosphere. Beyond the bay's magnetic field he could see the massive rock formations that represented the remnants of Sernpidal. He could see a few picket ships beyond the rock formations, but since the tightly clumped formation of rocks was considered impassable, they were few and far between. The main concentration of Imperial forces lay on the opposite side of the rings.

Dipping into the Force once more, Tobin cried, "There's an evacuation shuttle taking passengers in the next bay!"

His voice reverberated through the crowd in front of his shuttle, and they responded immediately. The vast majority of them rushed screaming toward the next bay. Only a few hundred remained behind. Tobin noticed they were the families with young children, already exhausted from terror and their run here. These were the parents that, when faced with abandoning their children for a chance for survival, chose instead to stay with and comfort their offspring.

These were the people Tobin was willing to save.

"Master Shaper Dezcartri?" he said with a bow. He led her toward the crowd. They no longer bothered to try and board the shuttle.

"This is my ship," he announced as he arrived. "I'm willing to give passage to everyone I can. The Imperials are planning on destroying the station. So decide now what's important—yourselves or your bags. There won't be room for both."

The hatch opened on his slave command and he stepped in with Dezcartri a step behind. "Please wait for me in the cockpit," he told her. People started crowding toward him, but those in front didn't understand what barrier prevented them from boarding.

Tobin eyed the first people in line. "Families and children only at first." He allowed the barrier to drop and allowed people to start boarding. "Quickly, now," he said. He felt the danger growing in the Force. The last of the boarding ships were away, and as soon as they were safely out of the line of fire, the station would die.

He lightly scanned the minds in the crowd for potential threats. Not surprisingly, he found a couple that he rejected.

The first man started to pull a blaster when he suddenly found himself flying over the edge of the gantry and down the 30 meter drop to the empty hanger bay floor. The second man simply froze under Tobin's gaze. After a moment, he nodded in defeat and walked away.

Finally, the shuttle was loaded to capacity. Almost all those who remained were aboard save two families.

"Any more weight and I won't be able to get us out of here," Tobin said. "We're already past capacity."

Three fathers stepped forward. "They can have our spaces," the Chiss and two humans all agreed.

Tobin nodded and allowed the three men to depart and the two mothers and four children to board. The weight difference was negligible. The two fathers with those last aboard stared back at their weeping wives.

Tobin looked at the men. "I wish I had room," he told them sincerely.

"Save our families," one of the humans said. "That's enough."

"I'll take them someplace safe," Tobin promised. He sealed the hatch, and turned to face the terrified crowds. "Everyone, we're still in serious danger. I want you all to sit down as best you can since we have some rough flying ahead of us."

He then ran back to the cockpit where Dezcartri sat patiently.

Suddenly the front of the hanger bay exploded violently. "They've opened fire," Tobin muttered. He powered the shuttle up and broke from the moorings. He spun the ship as around them more explosions ripped through the hanger. He caught a brief glimpse of the five men he left behind running away from the explosions, only to be pulled violently toward the hole by the massive decompression.

Tobin felt their lives end, along with the lives of thousand others. He poured on the power and zipped out of the hanger bay on the far side of the station. He saw and felt hundreds, even thousands of similar-sized ships also pouring out of bays all around the station.

Some went the safe passage around the rings, only to be met by a line of waiting Imperial ships.

Tobin knew with certainty that if he went that direction, they would all die.

"Did you eat before coming here?" Tobin asked his co-pilot.

"I did not," Dezcartri said.

"Good."

Tobin pulled the control stick back hard and the nose of the shuttle jerked up so fast the inertial dampeners could not keep up. People in the back screamed as the shuttle suddenly shot up against the far side of the rings. He spun the shuttle around until it was upside down relative to its original position, and then plunged into the planetary remnants.

He felt other ships, desperate for a way out, follow him. Unconsciously, he reached out for them and guided their movements. In a real sense, he slaved the other pilots to his own actions. If he collided with a rock, they would as well.

He learned flying from both his mother and Darth Valus. The Sith was actually a better pilot than even his own mother. However, Tobin admitted that in this one area, he was never able to match his teachers. Still, he flew with the Force guiding him. He sank into the power once more, anticipating the gravitational fields and how they affected the ships, and were affected by those ships.

Their passage caused mountain-sized rocks to tumble. Boulder-sized rocks spun with their passage. Smaller rocks were caught in their wake and slammed into the particle shielding of the shuttles behind.

They spun wildly, coming to almost complete stops and then zooming forward as fast as their ships permitted. They circumnavigated a continental-sized remnant of stone left riddled with mining shafts and even what looked like a stretch of paved road. They spun wildly through showers of ship-sized rocks destabilized by their passage.

It was the most intense flying Tobin had ever done, and it was only half the struggle. His shuttle and perhaps a dozen more emerged on the far size of the planetary remnant and found themselves facing three frigates in a wide picket formation. Though he could not see or scan them with his ship's systems, he knew additional ships hovered along the edges of the remnant hoping he would try to skirt the edges of the rock clusters to find a more viable path.

He hit the comlink. "Sor'ai, this is S'Artin. The Rings have been attacked. I am carrying refugees. I'm looking at three frigates on the far side of the planetary remnant. Come in hot!"

"I'm coming," the new captain of the _Destiny_ said.

He then switched to a monitored frequency, knowing the Imperials would hear every word. There was no help for it. "Listen up; they have more picket ships above and below us. The only way out is forward. Chances are we are not all going to make it. Break formation and blow through at best speed."

"You're insane," a voice responded.

"Yes, I am," Tobin said. "Good luck."

He shoved the acceleration lever forward and the shuttle jumped into motion. Immediately, the other ships behind him did the same, spreading out as they attempted different vectors of escape. If it were only the three corvettes, he had no doubt they would make it. But it was not just corvettes. A swarm of fighters poured out of the three ships and headed directly toward them.

"Blow through," Tobin said.

"Is this ship armed?" Dezcartri said.

Tobin smiled. He had a master heavy weapons expert on his payroll. He reached across the board to a switch in front of the Sekotan Vong and pushed a button. The whole ship shuddered as a single missile suddenly shot out from below the bow.

"A single missile?" Dezcartri asked in disbelief.

The missile streaked forward toward the line of fighters. The fighters opened fire. Automated fire tracking systems honed in on the missile with speed that would have astounding fighters two hundred years ago. The missile exploded in a bright flash of expanding blue light.

"All ships pull up and away," Tobin cried into the com. "Avoid the blue field at all costs!"

"What was that thing?" Dezcartri demanded.

"And ion missile," Tobin said as he brought his shuttle up and around the expanding field. In the center, hundreds of Imperial fighters drifted powerless, like insects caught in sap. "Most military craft are hardened against ion cannons. But a missile can create a prolonged ionic field stronger than a cannon."

Over the com, other pilots were howling their approval as the dozen and one ships made for the blockading frigates. Heavy turbolaser cannon fire began to fill space around them. Tobin began swaying the shuttle through the shower of destructive energy. Nearby, one of the escaping pirate ships exploded. To the starboard side, another ship erupted.

Tobin blocked their deaths from his perception and concentrated on the oncoming fire. There was no way to respond to the fire itself. He sank into the Force and anticipated where the fire would be. Once more he reached out to the other pilots, allowing his perception to envelope the whole field.

At exactly that moment, a behemoth emerged in an inverted position directly over the three Imperial frigates. The _Sword of Stars_ cast a pall of death over the Imperials even as it fired its main gun.

The center frigate exploded. The other captains following Tobin cried out in fear, until he hit the monitor. "That's my ship," he said. "Blow through!"

The two Imperial frigates that remained immediately opened fire on the larger ship, which returned heavy fire using just its turbolaser cannons. Moments later two more frigates arrived—the _Absolute_ and the _Destiny._ Both frigates began firing on the same target, which allowed the _Sword of Stars_ to concentrate solely on the other.

The overpowered imperials began listing and out-gassing huge billows of flame. Only when they stopped firing did Tobin's people let up. "Sor'ai, good timing," he called over the secured com. "There are a couple of hundred perfectly good fighters behind us. Let's pick 'em up before we go."

"Already on it, Admiral," Captain Soonta said.

Tobin switched frequencies again.

"This is Tobin S'Artin_,_" he said over the com. He knew the Imperials would receive the transmission, but he didn't care. "Those ships are mine. If you want to join me, then make for the Ithorian cruiser to dock. Otherwise, may the Force be with you."

~~Last Jedi~~

~~Last Jedi~~

Moff Hershied watched with narrowed eyes as missiles slammed into the sides of the massive Ring structure. The upper ring was already beginning crumble under the onslaught, and the lower ring was blazing with escaping oxygen to feed the fires.

Smaller ships continued to pour out of the dying station, only to be shot down by fighters or capital ship fire. Most, that is.

The Zabrak's Star Destroyer managed to break the blockade through sheer brute size and strength, but not before taking a terrible pounding. Admiral Gest'aka assigned three frigates to pursue the lumbering giant. Other, smaller corvettes and freighters also managed to get through the blockade and were being vigorously pursued.

"Admiral," the communications officer said with a sharp salute, "pickets on the far side of the planetary remnant report they are under attack by superior numbers. They intercepted transmissions indicating Tobin S'Artin was on one of the ships escaping the ring, but where attacked by…"

Hershied was on her feet the moment she heard. "What?"

"Lieutenant, report!" Admiral Gest'aka barked.

"Sir," the communications offer said with a pale face, "we have lost contact with all three frigates. Observation drones show all three have been destroyed. However, voice print analysis confirms that one of the escapees to board the attacking ships was S'Artin."

The bridge was deathly silent for a full minute before Hershied said, "Admiral Gest'aka, call off the attack. Our quarry has escaped and the station has been destroyed. There is no point wasting further resources." She took a deep breath. "Open a general broadcast to all ships."

"Open," Gest'aka said.

"This is Moff Dila Hershied of his Majesty's Imperial Navy. The destruction here today was because of one man, and one man only. Though I have in the past allowed you all to live your lives in peace, the acts of sedition and treason committed by Tobin S'Artin cannot be allowed. Anyone who house him will be destroyed. Any who support him will be killed. I deeply regret the pain you had to suffer this day, but remember the lesson in it as well. Those who rise against the Empire shall perish."

She nodded to her admiral, who closed the channel. She then turned and stalked out of the bridge.


	27. Picking Up The Pieces

Thanks for everyone's patience on review responses. I've posted the Chapter 26 review responses to the Last Jedi forum.

* * *

**Chapter Twenty-Seven: Picking Up The Pieces**

Tobin was not surprised when only four of the escaping ships from the Rings docked with the _Sword of Stars_.

Once the ships were secured in the kilometer-long cruiser's spacious hangar bay with Tobin's shuttle, and Sor'ai collected the fighters while abandoning the pilots to float free in their space-worthy flight suits, the small fleet jumped.

The four other ships were freighters of one type or another. Smuggling ships, all of them. Through the Force Tobin could sense that each carried refugees. The ships that abandoned them held only the original crews.

He opened a signal. "Before we all spill out into the hangar, let's get a head count, please. This is S'Artin. I have close to two hundred men, women and children of mixed species aboard and we're very cramped."

"This is Captain Ashotal aboard the freighter _Ash'lokk_," a Gotal said. "I have two hundred, mostly Gotal and a few humans."

"This is Santis Fultan," a human male said. "My ship's the _Astral Son_. I have eighty. Mixed races."

"Thrana Aspial," a Zelosian female said. "I have a clan of Zelosians and some Ryn."

"Antia Malnick," a female Zabrak said. "I haven't even checked the ship's registry yet. It was open and I took it. I have four hundred Zabraks, Arkanians, Chalactans and ten very depressed Zeltrons. And I'm pretty sure that whole fiasco was because of you, S'Artin."

Tobin nodded to himself. "You're probably right, Antia. The Empire wants me very badly. So I'm not going to tell any of you what to do. I will say that I have a world with a small colony of Borali and a big colony of free Wookiees, and another world that I'm working on. The colony will accept your refugees, but if you don't join me then we'll have to transfer your refugees aboard one of my ships. I won't release coordinates to my worlds to anyone I can't trust."

Tobin could hear the Gotal grunt. "I would have to meet you in person to know if I can trust you."

Tobin knew very little about Gotals, except that they had a biological empathy that made them very good judges of character.

"There's no time like the present."

Haslo Bard was waiting for him with a squad of troopers and a larger group of Ulicians with medical supplies and food. Tobin greeted the man with a sad smile. "This was a crime," he said.

Bard nodded. "The Empire grows angry."

"It grows desperate," he said. "Targeting civilians is an act of terror."

Around him, the freighters were disgorging their people. The refugees were still shaking and terrified, but the Ulicians, having just gone through their own Imperial holocaust, quickly set up a line to aid them in the hangar. Tobin meanwhile concentrated on the captains while Dezcartri, unsure of her place, followed close behind.

It took only a moment to identify the four ship captains. Ashotal was a typical Gotal, with two large flesh horns protruding from the top of his squat, thick head. Santis Fultan was a short, thin man with a pock-marked face and deep-set, haunted eyes. Thrana Aspial was a typical Zelosian, ridiculously attractive in a purple jump suit that left so much skin bare it hardly provided for modesty. Zelosians looked and often acted human even to the extent that female Zelonians imitated human female attributes (minus nipples on their breast-like organs) but they were in fact sentient, bipedal plants with liquid chlorophyll for blood.

The last, Antia Malnick, was a gray-haired female Zabrak with a faded set of traditional tattoos on her face and hands. She wore a blaster at each hip and a dark leather smock over her spacer's jumpsuit. She watched as Tobin and Dezcartri approached. "What are you doing with a Vong?" she snapped.

Dezcartri stiffened. "I do not insult you, why do you insult me?"

"She is Ashala Dezcartri, a Sekotan Vong. She's with me. Now, to the point. I'm Tobin S'Artin. I can help your refugees. The question is whether you wish to join me, or go back out on your own."

The Gotal simply stared at Tobin a moment, before he sniffed. "You smell of blood. Dark and light fight in you. But you keep your word."

"What in the stars is that supposed to mean?" Santis Fultan demanded.

"He is the one who guided my hand through the planet," Ashotal said with certainty to the others. "I could never have flown so well on my own. I am a fair pilot, but not that good. He guided me with the Force."

The others exchanged knowing glances. "It is Force-skill called battle meditation," Tobin admitted. "I did not even mean to do it. However, I'm glad I was able to help. But the question remains, do you want to be a part of my organization or not?"

"My home is gone," Ashotal said. "I have nowhere else to go. I see that you will kill our enemies. You will keep your word. That is enough for me and my crew."

"It's not enough for me," Malnick said. "What in the stars have you been doing to make the Empire that mad?"

"They see me as a threat," Tobin said.

"Are you?"

"Very much so."

This made the others stare at each other. "Look," Fultan said, "I appreciate you helping me out and taking these people off me hands. I have a few legit contracts with my other stuff. All things being equal, I'd just as soon be on my way."

"You're free to go," Tobin said.

"Just like that?" Fultan said. "No threats?"

Tobin shrugged. "We're nowhere near my bases, and it'd be stupid to kill someone I just saved. Go ahead and go, and good luck to you."

Fulton shrugged, then nodded in farewell and walked back to his ship. Thrana Aspial shrugged. "We have nowhere else to go. We were merchants on the Rings and that was where our homes were. With the Rings gone, there is nothing left for us."

"You'll be welcome," Tobin said. Finally he turned back to Antia Malnick. In the Force he could feel her anger over the attack.

"This is all your fault," she finally said.

"It would have happened eventually," Tobin said. "We were pirates. The Rings was a pirate base. Eventually, for political or military reasons, the Empire would have had to attack. I just accelerated it. But know this, Antia. I am a threat to the Empire. In fact, I'm the greatest threat the Empire has ever known. And I'm going to become even more of a threat, not just to the Empire, but to the Emperor himself."

"With what? Just three ships?"

"Three at the moment," Tobin said. "With two more nearing readiness. I anticipate more to come."

"Five ships. A few frigates and a couple of freighters, I bet," Antia muttered. "What a threat."

"We have a restored _Scythe_-class heavy cruiser coming up soon," Tobin corrected.

Malnick blinked. "_Scythe_-class?"

"I understand we also have a star destroyer next on our list."

"Who the hell are you?" she asked.

"A spark," Tobin said. "Are you with us or not?"

"I'm with you just to see a _Scythe_-class ship," Malnick said.

"Good. Because I'm going to need a lot more personnel in the near future."

~~Last Jedi~~

~~Last Jedi~~

The Zabrak stood on the center of the bridge with his hugely muscled arms crossed as the last wisps of smoke escaped through the air cyclers. Half the control stations were just pits of burned slag, though at least the bodies were moved.

The escape from the Rings was the most harrowing experience the destroyer had been through under its current leadership. They exhausted almost half their fuel supply jumping around the galaxy in a desperate attempted to escape their pursuers. They finally lost track three jumps ago, but did not dare relax their guard.

The sheer amount of damage was numbing. Almost a quarter of the ship was without any power or life support of any kind, and there were so many hull breaches that almost a fifth of the ship was actually exposed to hard vacuum. Power supply nodes were shorting across the superstructure, and the casualties were unimaginable. It felt as if the Zabrak had lost half his family, including Aleusa. His partner in leadership died when the command deck got hit. The shielding held the air in, but the tubolaser strike burned through the communications pit and flash-seared her instantly into carbon molecules.

Now the Zabrak was trying to figure out what to do next.

He turned to see a Chadra-fan have his size walk up to him. "Auxiliary power is back up," Shuut said. "We can jump when we need to. There's something else, though."

"What?"

Shuut's large ears twitched. "The Holonet announced the attack as a strike against Tobin S'Artin and piracy in general. It's being hailed as a major success. But that means it's over."

Zabrak nodded. Perhaps they could salvage some supplies from the Rings wreckage. "We'll go back, then," he said. Shuut nodded and turned to go about his duties and the Zabrak turned to the remnants of his bridge crew. "Best speed to the Rings."

They arrived three days later. As they emerged from hyperspace the Zabrak stood at main viewport and looked upon the station upon which he was born.

The station was a burnt out shell of its former self. The upper ring was a charred skeleton of exposed support struts. The lower ring, while physically still intact, was not much better. The rocky nodes through which the rings passed appeared relatively intact, but Zabrak knew better than to hope.

The one thing he did see, however, was that they were not alone. Perhaps fifty to sixty other ships from freighters to old frigates held position before the damaged station. Smaller ships, jitneys and probes scanned the Rings looking for survivors.

"We're receiving a transmission from the Ring Authority," one of Aleusa's protégés said. "They are scanning for survivors and are requesting assistance."

"Tell them we'll assist," the Zabrak said. "Launch our shuttles with skeleton crews only and space suits. In the meantime, scan for hypermatter containers. We need to stock up. We'll do what we can to help them while we help ourselves."

The young human girl nodded. "Two Imperial frigates just emerged from hyperspace!" the girl suddenly cried out. "They're heading right toward us. We don't have full sensors, but I think…." She stopped when the speakers overhead hiccupped with the receipt of a signal.

"Zabrak, this is S'Artin. I trust you're feeling well."

The Zabrak ground his teeth. "What the hell are you doing?"

"Well, I came to assist with survivors," Tobin said. "But then I saw your ship here. Looks like it took a real beating. I'm sorry about Aleusa."

"How did you know about her?"

"I don't feel her aboard," Tobin's disembodied voice said. "I owe you a great deal of pain, my friend. You betrayed me. You've helped the Imperials kill everyone I've ever loved. And I have two fully armed and operational Imperial frigates with enough weapons pointed at your decrepit old hulk to end you and all those aboard. But I'm going to give you a last chance to show you actually have some honor. Before I destroy everyone on that ship, I'm going to allow you to board a shuttle and leave. I will take your ship as payment for the harm you have done to me and mine. I might even let you live."

"Over my dead body."

"I'm okay with that too," came the amused reply. "I have a concussion missile aimed directly at you, personally. You have no shields, so it will destroy the command tower and probably kill everyone aboard, but you will be among the first to die. I'm sure Chuut, Tagulla the Hut and all the others will appreciate it."

Zabrak realized the human girl in the tech station was staring at him. He recognized her as Aleusa's niece. The whole command staff was. He felt their eyes from all around.

His mind raced. The only thing working on the ship was life support and the hyperdrive. They didn't even have laser cannons. The ship was completely defenseless.

"I'll go," he said. "But don't think I'm ever going to forget this." He turned to the girl. "Call the shuttles back."

"They haven't left yet," she said quietly.

Zabrak nodded and stalked off the bridge. It took nearly half an hour to make it to the docking bay since he had to walk and climb manually the entire way there. Once he made it, however, he found a single shuttle waiting, along with a hundred of his best raiders.

"We're going with you," Chartris, his Echani raid leader, said. "All of us."

Zabrak threw his shoulders back with pride when he looked at his men. They were his children, his brethren. His soldiers. "All right, then!" he said. "Let's go, but don't every think we won't be back. This is our ship!"

With a cheer, the Zabrak and his men boarded the shuttle and flew out of the docking back toward the Rings. The concussion missile struck them before they even cleared the bow of the star destroyer. With a final curse, the Zabrak and his best raiders died in a blaze of fire.

The command crew of the star destroyer, mostly teenagers called on to replace the adults who died while running the blockade, stared for the longest time through the viewports where their leader died.

Their stillness was shattered when Chuut came running back onto the deck. "What happened?' the Chadra-fan said. He had trained many of the children there.

"Zabrak is dead," Aleusa's protégé and niece said. Her name, which the Zabrak had forgotten, was Chiala Antias. "Someone named S'Artin has two Imperial Frigates aimed at us. He ordered Zabrak to leave the ship or he would kill us all."

Chuut started chattering in his native language when the speakers came back to life. "Who is next in command?" S'Artin's voice said.

"Tobin? It's Chuut. What are you doing, boy?"

"Taking your ship."

The diminutive Chuut's ears pulled forward. "Why? It's falling apart."

"It's in better shape than almost any other _Pellaeon-_class star destroyer I know of," Tobin said. "For the moment, anyway. You need to make a decision, my friend. Are you going to cooperate?"

Chuut shrugged. "Of course. I just want to know what's going on."

"This is what's going to happen," Tobin said. "I have another ship arriving shortly. We're going to offer sanctuary to anyone who wants it and who is not a threat to my operation. I know you're in bad shape—but you still have facilities to hold more evacuees. I want your remaining shuttles over there assisting with the search for people, while my people will be scavenging for supplies. For the moment, you will be in charge of that ship."

Chuut thought about it for a moment, and then nodded. "Okay, we can do that."

The Chadra-fan nodded to Chiala, who quickly reissued the order for shuttles to head toward the station. Moments later another ship emerged from hyperspace. It was very nearly as large as the star destroyer, but had an organic feel to its cigar-shaped structure reminiscent of the original Mon-Cal heavy cruisers. It was also studded with an array of heavy weapons.

By now the other ships attempting rescue had noticed the two frigates and the third monster. The frigate was large enough at 600 meters, but the _Sword of Stars_ was a thousand meters long and bristling with enough armament to stand up to a squadron of imperial frigates.

On the bridge of the _Destiny_, Tobin nodded to Sor'ai Soonta to announce his offer of assistance. He listened as the responses came in. After Moff Hershied's announcement, he was frankly expecting to be cursed blue. However, the anger he sensed was not directed at him.

Hershied had betrayed a trust the Rings had with her. She was the destroyer, not Tobin.

Tobin knew he would not be able to grab everyone, nor would he want to. But there would be enough to start strong. Luxurious shuttles from the _Sword of Stars_ joined the more military shuttles of the _Destiny_ in flight toward the rings. Tobin took the lead in the first shuttle and began slow passes over the rings themselves, searching with others.

"Ring Authority, this is S'Artin of the _Destiny_," he said. "I'm sensing survivors in the ocean nodes. Lots of them."

"We're aware of the survivors but we have not been able to pressurize the transport tube safely enough to evacuate them."

"The _Destiny_ has a military-grade boarding ship. We can launch it into the transport tube itself until it forms a seal."

"That would work," came the response.

The boarding ship was the same reinforced conical craft that helped invade the station. The ship fired a drilling laser from its tip as it approached the target and then simply rammed through. In this case, they deactivated the laser and let the ship fly into the tube until it sealed it with permafoam.

Ring Authority personnel then used precision lasers to cut away the tube that projected out from the rocky node until the back of the boarding ship was exposed. Jutting between the powerful thrusters was a universal docking clamp.

"_Sword of Stars_, this is S'Artin."

"Silmari here."

"Captain, you're about to receive refugees. Please keep them in the hanger bay for now until we can determine how trustworthy they are. If you have any trouble-makers, take them out. If the whole crowd is not controllable, we may have to space them all."

Silmari did not hesitate. "Understood."

In the meantime, Tobin used the Force to guide his own shuttles for material. Any base that served as a trading post would have armaments. Tobin found them all—missiles, torpedoes, dovin basils, hypermatter—anything that was of use. Stored flash-frozen foods were impervious to vacuum or cold—Tobin took it all. Trip after trip, his people raided the rings for everything they could carry, while Silmari's large shuttles ferried stunned, hungry survivors to safety. The operation took days, during which time Tobin did not sleep at all.

The majority of the survivors were simply life-long residents of the Rings who had no means of escape. They were merchants and traders, wives and children, husbands and fathers. Tobin twice scanned the survivors they picked up and every time the Force assured him there was no threat. These people were in shock, and grateful to be alive.

"Okay, let's spread them out," Tobin told Silmari on their third day. The Devaronian's fur looked lank and her eyes had a dull gleam in them from exhaustion. Still, she stood straight as she nodded.

"I'll assign quarters. The foodstuffs you sent should be enough to get us back to Sestia."

"We'll need to let Sula's people know we're coming."

Too tired to speak, Silmari merely nodded.

After five days of constant work, the _Destiny_'s supply and hanger bays were filled to capacity to armaments and foodstuffs. The _Sword of Stars_ was filled with the fifty thousand survivors they managed to extract from the shattered rings and more foodstuffs, and the Zabrak's star destroyer was repaired sufficiently to make the trip to the Baroli colony on Sestia.

As they were pulling out, Sor'ai walked to his side. "We've had a request from two of the ships assisting with the rescue efforts to join us. The _Anastoli_ and the _Gambit_. Both are 200 meter corvettes in the Imperial style. Old, but still operational."

Tobin nodded. "Let me talk to their captains."

After a brief discussion with the captains, Tobin agreed to let them come. When he arrived, he had three ships. When he left, he had six.

* * *

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Thank you for reading!


	28. Ultimatum

Author's notes and review responses can be found in my forums. Thank you for reading.

* * *

**Chapter Twenty-Eight: Ultimatum**

Chanter Sulari, the son of Sula Sulari, was a man in his late twenties. Like his mother, he had a gift for detail and organization, and through sheer force of will was the de facto administrator of Haven on Sestia III.

Like his mother, Chanter was not too keen on having another hundred thousand mouths to feed. The survivors of the Star Destroyer mixed with the refugees from the Rings and had no place to go but the planet.

Where his mother would have thrown a fit at Tobin's news, the younger Sulari merely shrugged. "They'll get tired of grain mush, but they won't starve," he said. "So long as they're willing to work, we'll take them. But we should locate them in Hastings. Haven is at capacity at the moment with the people we already have until we expand our water treatment plant."

And so the survivors of the Rings and the majority of the permanent population of Zabrak's star destroyer, many of whom had never set foot on a natural world, found themselves colonists on a brand new planet filled with blue skies, bluer oceans, and snow-capped mountains.

They arrived back at Dubrillion two days later and discovered a surprise. A _Scythe_-class heavy cruiser orbited the planet under its own power. As they arrived, he could see sparks from the workers in space suits still finishing the outer hull, but the fact it was in orbit proved at the least that its repulsor and drive systems were functional.

He shuttled over to the latest addition to his rag-tag fleet and unsurprisingly found Sana Fieliel and Chabacaala the Wookiee in the ship's main hangar pouring over schematics while around them Wookiees and Sula's people continued work.

They looked up as Tobin's shuttle entered the bay. The Omwati watched Tobin with an expression vacillating between pride and her normal resentment. Tobin quickly realized he needed to play to the former feeling. "Sana, this is incredible," he said as he approached them. "I never dreamed you'd be able to get her into orbit so quickly."

The patch of red feathers that served as her hair fluffed a little in surprise. "Yes, well, it was a chore, but Chabacaala was instrumental."

"I knew she would be," Tobin agreed. "The Rings were destroyed."

"I heard," Sana said in a neutral tone.

"I've recovered armaments and refugees," Tobin said. "And enough flash-frozen supplies to last until Sestia is able to start producing sufficient food for all of us. I've also picked up a mostly functioning _Pellaeon_-class star destroyer, and two older corvettes."

Sana's eyes widened. "What?"

"The star destroyer was a ship I lived on for several years after the Imperials tried to murder me. It is ancient and in ill repair, but it has life-support and a functioning hyperdrive. I've taken most of the beings that lived on it to Sestia, but it retains a skeleton crew. I've renamed it the _Hubris_."

He caught her wry smile. "Surprisingly appropriate for you," she said. "So what's your priority?"

"This ship for now," Tobin said. "I want to see it finished as much as you. I'll start shipping over the hard-point ordinance we recovered from our salvage operations when you're ready. How much more time will you need?"

Sana looked at Chabacaala, who merely nodded. "One more week," she said. "And one more thing."

"What?"

Chabacaala growled and his translation implant converted it to basic. "Start training crews and pilots. They never removed the fighters when they dropped the ship into the surface. You will have a full wing of X-83 twintail starfighters available when we are done."

Tobin grinned. "What a wonderful dilemma to have."

~~Last Jedi~~

~~Last Jedi~~

It was, Tobin realized, his very first true staff meeting. After almost a year of being a pirate, he now had a fleet of his own ships, a thriving shipping line that was now accounting for a third of their profit, and a staff. He also realized that with the staff and an organization that—including colonists—now approached three quarters of a million people, he needed more structure than just him telling people what to do.

Some of the people sitting in the conference room of the shipyard had been with him from his first days as a pirate. Others had had known for barely a month. But scanning them all in the Force, he knew that whether they agreed with everything he did or not, they would at least follow orders.

"Thank you all for coming," Tobin said. He smiled at how young he sounded. Then again, compared to most in the room, he was young. "As you've noticed, things have become very busy lately between here and Sestia. Sula, you've pointed out recently that communication channels were becoming clogged and essentially we were bogging down in every respect. So I've called this meeting to establish a corporate and military command structure."

He stood up and paced a little, allowing their eyes to follow him. "All of you, to one extent or another, know who and what I am. I have the Force. That makes me very lethal. Some of you also know that I have a grudge against the Empire. My ultimate goal is to end the slaughter of innocent children because of high midi-chlorian counts. This may take something approaching an armed confrontation."

Everyone had heard it before, he knew. He could sense disbelief among many. The Empire had always been and would always be. To challenge it was suicide. And yet, they stayed.

"I am not, however, an expert in all things," Tobin continued. "And it would be foolish of me to pretend any different. Make no mistake—this is my operation. If any of you betray me or act with negligence that does me or mine harm, I will kill you. But the reason you are here is that I do not believe any of you will do that. You've shown me you are loyal, skilled and intelligent, and I will need all those in the future. So this is how it is going to be from now on. We're all joining the Sestia Navy. Since no one knows where Sestia is, it seems a suitable name."

"First, let's start with the Corporate side. Vilmarn, congratulations, you are now the Senior Vice President of Sestia Shipping. You've done an incredible job with the line so far. How many ships do we have?"

"Ten," Vilmarn said with a toothy grin that would look terrifying to anyone who did not know him. "And I am in negotiations to add another fifteen ships onto the payroll. We pay the highest commissions of any line. The barrister tells me her office has even been contacted by the Empire for a possible commission."

Tobin laughed and the irony of that nugget. "Well, I'm going to continue being hands off. I trust you. More importantly, I trust Silmari to keep you in line."

"As all males should be," Vilmarn's wife barked.

That gave the women in the room a laugh and broke some of the tension.

"We now have a fully functioning fleet," he said. "Not a huge one, but it's a solid start. We have the _Ackbar, Destiny, Absolute, Sword of Stars, Ulicia, Anastoli_ and the _Gambit_. The _Prophet_, and _Hubris_, two Pellaeon-class star destroyers, should be space worthy within three months. More will be coming. I've learned that the Guildmaster, a free Wookiee on the Rings, survived with much of his staff. He has agreed to come here and aid our cause. His dry-dock facilities were deep enough in the first ring to survive most of the damage. His people have already disconnected it and the _Sword of Stars_ will be towing it and his people here. That will give us additional building capacity beyond our current shipyard. And now I need a command structure to go with the fleet."

He tapped the wall, which blinked and showed a chart. "I believe I am the youngest Grand Moff in history. But since I'm adopting the Imperial hierarchy, the title grants me both military and civilian authority over Dubrillion, Sestia and all those both military and civilian in the Sestia organization. On the civilian side, I am also the President and majority owner of both the shipping corporation and the incorporated colony."

Down the table, Antia Malnick cleared her throat. "I get you're the super warrior and you can kill us all. But truly, kid, do you think you're even remotely qualified or even capable of ruling a planet?"

The room went completely silent. Tobin looked at the faces around the table and realized that with the exception of Sor'ai, he was at minimum a decade or more younger than everyone in the room. Those who had seen him fight did not dare speak aloud, but he could sense everyone waiting for an answer.

His Sith training called out to kill her where she sat, but he knew he would need her skill set. He had looked her up on the _Destiny's_ databanks and discovered she had a history with the Empire.

"It's a fair question," he finally admitted. "During the Clone Wars that preceded the fall of the Old Republic, Jedi knights were appointed as generals. Padawans as young as fourteen found themselves holding the ranks of commanders, because of the assumption that their decisions would be guided by the Force. A small group of peacekeepers suddenly became the commanders of a vast galactic army."

"I never heard that in history class," Captain Deastri said. The former slave ship captain was a product of Imperial education.

"I own a holocron—a Jedi database if you will—that contains the personality matrix of my penultimate grandmother, Jedi Master Leia Skywalker Solo. Jaina Fel's mother, for those of you who did not know the first Empress was a Jedi Master. Master Solo's adopted father was the senator of a long-dead planet called Alderaan and witnessed the end of the Republic, and the treachery that led to the fall of the Jedi at the hands of the First Galactic Emperor—a Sith Lord. But until that time, there was a war fought with hundreds of millions of soldiers across the galaxy, often led by Jedi children."

He paced across the width of the conference room, searching for guidance in the Force. "We are here today because of me. Many of you are alive because of me. If you have any doubts, ask Afton there, or Sula Santaari. I am not just a warrior. I am what one past Jedi Master called a living Shatterpoint. I am a creator of destinies. My actions can have huge repercussions not just in the Force, but in the galaxy as a whole."

"Forgive me for sounding skeptical," Malnick said, "but no one person is that important."

"The Emperor is," Tobin said, squarely meeting her eyes. "And I will be Emperor one day."

There was some uncomfortable shifting in the room as he lifted his signet ring. "Silmari and those who came with me on the _Destiny_ know what this ring is. Sana Fieliel and Askad Dekarta were there when a Royal Genealogist verified it. This is an Imperial signet ring. It has been passed down through my family since the reign of Soonter Fel II. It may only be worn by a genetic descendent of the Imperial Family. Any other person attempting to wear it will loose a finger."

"You're joking," Malnick muttered.

Fieliel shook her head. "I wish he were. I knew Hendt Reindel, the Royal Genealogist. The man was absolutely terrified when he verified the ring was authentic." She turned to Tobin. "For better or worse, S'Artin is a Fel."

"The Force was strong with the Fels for many generations before it was declared anathema," Tobin explained. "I am descended from the last Force-strong member of the Fel family, the Princess Sariah. Not only was she Force strong, but she was the elder child, and the Imperial Family was not patriarchal at that time. The oldest surviving line always assumed the throne. We've been in hiding for generations. I am hiding no more. I aim to fight not the Empire, but the man in charge of it. I aim to challenge Emperor Antius Huun Fel III for the throne."

"That's treason," Askad Dekarta said. The Gungan slumped in his chair at the end of the conference table.

"It's only treason if we lose," Tobin said with a vicious smile. "I don't intend to lose."

He started his pacing again. "But back to the original question—am I competent to lead? I believe the fact I've built a small Empire in the course of a year should answer that question. However, that doesn't mean that I'm competent to do everything myself. I know I'm not. And that's why we're here today, to establish a hierarchy. So, here we go:

"As mentioned, I am naming myself Grand Moff in the Imperial Style. Directly underneath me will be two admirals. Sula Santari is the vice admiral in charge of all logistics and operations. Silmari Frark will assume the role of Fleet Admiral. I will assume she wants to keep the _Sword of Stars_ as her flagship.

"Ms. Malnick, you are now a Commodore. I am assigning you the role of instructor for a naval academy you're going to build. We need crews, and I need someone with your background to teach them."

"What?" the older woman did not look happy.

"I pulled your official record from the _Destiny's_ files. You were a frigate captain in the Empire before you were dismissed. You struck a senior officer, I believe. But you graduated in the top tier of your class at the Bastion Academy and had a solid performance as captain, despite your spotty record for insubordination. We have an actual fleet, and I need competent command crews to fly those ships. And I want them to learn from the best. That's you. You're going to start with Rear Admiral Silmari Frark, and Captains Shindo, Haslo and Corra Bard and all the other captains I'm selecting."

He turned to Sor'ai Soonta. "Captain Sor'ai Soonta, the _Destiny_ is yours. You will train your own people."

He turned to Kenth. "Kenth, I am naming you General of the Army within the Sestia Defense Force. When she's ready, you will command the _Sariah's Song_, a _Scythe_-class heavy cruiser that Sana will be lifting to the new facility the Guildmaster is bringing. The rest of you will be captains and will receive ships either as they come ready, or will already have ships waiting.

"As you can tell, I'm following the standard Imperial ranking system. You can select who you need for your staffs and crews from the available pool. Please keep the staffs at the minimum necessary to do the jobs. You are authorized to promote people up to the pay grade just under your own and to hire from the general populations now on Sestia, including any Wookiees interested in working for you. Higher promotions need to come from me. Pay will be in Imperial credits. We won't pay as much as the actual Empire for obvious reasons, but it will be real currency. Sula, you, Antia and Silmari will need to sit down with me regarding budgets."

~~Last Jedi~~

~~Last Jedi~~

Ashala Dezcartri waved her hand as she walked into Tobin's office on the shipyard_._ He looked up from the proposed budget and smiled in greeting. "Well?" he asked.

"I have spoken to my people," the master shaper said, "and we have agreed to assist you. Supplies are en route. However, the biots we will use will break down not only the radiation, but also the hypermatter itself. If you wish to try and salvage it, you must do so quickly."

"Fieliel and Santari's people are already doing so," Tobin said. "Will you oversee the procedure?"

"I will. A dhuryam has already been selected and is coming with the other materiel." She eyed Tobin speculatively. "You are a royal, then?"

Tobin nodded.

"If you regain your throne, what of the Sekotan Vong?"

"There are hundreds of worlds dead through war or pollution," Tobin said. "Worlds the Empire has essentially abandoned. I think it would be a foolish waste of resources not to hire the Sekotan Vong in the restoration of these worlds. I'm sure an Imperially chartered corporation would have to be formed, and equally sure that such a corporation would have significant profits to aid in the well-being of the Sekotan Vong people."

"And if you lose?"

"On my life, I swear they will never know you helped us," Tobin promised.

Dezcartri nodded. "That is all we needed to hear."

~~Last Jedi~~

~~Last Jedi~~

Moff Dila Hershied sat quietly in the VIP quarters of the corvette.

Her room's speakers announced they were entering Corusca Control. She took a long drink of wine to steady her nerves, and then stood. She looked at herself in the mirror and made a show of straitening her uniform. Her hair was appropriately dyed to hide the gray she had developed just in the past twelve months. Though she still looked good, she could not help but notice new lines around her eyes and mouth. It would be time to visit her surgeon again soon.

She barely felt their entry into the atmosphere. The Emperor had granted her ship permission to land—something very rare.

By the time she left her quarters and walked through the ship they were already settling down at the Naval space port. She took the lift to the lower most level of the ship where the captain awaited her with two troopers. "Moff Hershied," the man said with a bow. "I want you to know, Ma'am, that we are all with you."

She bit the inside of her cheek viciously to keep her eyes dry. "Thank you, Captain." He nodded and stepped away from the lift entrance. Dila stepped in with her trooper escorts, and the three of them dropped down the side of the front starboard landing strut, until they stepped out onto the hot surface of the landing pad.

A Navy speeder approached. The door opened, and an elderly gentlemen in a white uniform stepped out. Hershied bowed from the waist. "Grand Admiral Chinlee. It is an honor, sir."

"Shol did not want you hanging in the breeze alone," the supreme commander of the Navy said with a nod. "Until this messy business, your sector was the best performing. It is regrettable this happened on your watch. Please, the Emperor is waiting."

Hershied nodded and joined the Grand Admiral in the stretched black speeder car. Her escorts snapped to attention, then turned and marched back to the corvette.

"May I ask how bad it is?" Hershied asked.

"The Royal Genealogist, Reindel, is dead," Chinlee said. "He and his entire family, even his granddaughter, were killed in a speeder accident."

The grand old man of the Fleet spoke in a perfectly even tone of voice. His message was clear. People in positions of great power were dying because of Tobin S'Artin.

The Imperial Palace towered so far above the rest of the cityscape that it actually affected the weather patterns of the planet, the same as would a mountain range. Now, clouds were boiling up on the western side of the palace and causing a micro-thunderstorm just over that sector. The car flew right toward the storm while the two passengers rode in complete silence.

They finally landed in a massive hanger easily large enough to accommodate a full frigate. Indeed, a frigate occupied the sole docking berth. The frigate was painted a dark crimson with the Imperial Star in deep purple on the side. It was the Emperor's personal transport.

The passage through the palace took a long time. The structure was larger than most cities, with a permanent staff of several hundred thousand beings. However, the Grand Admiral was not without resources. A palace tram car arrived just after they passed through security and drove them through the cathedral-like interior. Hershied could count on one hand the number of times she had been in the palace. The last was her ascension to Moff.

As she looked up into colored transparisteel windows easily three hundred meters above her, she wondered if this would be her last such visit.

The lift to the Emperor's chamber was flanked by four Crimson Guardsmen. The soldiers, the best warriors in the Empire, stood impassively as Hershied and the Grand Admiral waited. Eventually the door opened, and the two stepped on.

The lift shot them up at two hundred klicks an hour. Even so it took almost a full three minutes until they reached the top of the tower and the court of His Imperial Majesty, Antius Huun Fel III.

They stepped out of the lift onto the foyer. Crimson guardsmen were again standing in silent formation around the room. Overhead, security scans analyzed everything about her, down to her subatomic components. She stood perfectly still for the scan and did not move until the guardsmen nearest the door nodded.

She and the admiral stepped into the court itself.

The court took up perhaps five thousand square meters of space and had a cathedral dome of neutronium and crystalium fitted together in a pattern that directed the sunlight onto the Imperial star on the floor. The floor itself was pristine Sacorran marble. The walls were lined with the most precious pieces of art the galaxy had ever produced.

She had more than a few as holographic copies in her own office.

The room buzzed with courtiers wearing finery that could have financed Hershied's entire sector for a month. And at the end of the room, sitting before a wall of transparisteel in the shape of the imperial star, so high the tops of the clouds boiled below, rested the throne. Upon the throne sat a stern man in his fifties with a perfectly trimmed goatee just hedged with silver. Eight guardsmen stood at attention behind him.

The Empress sat quietly beside him. Satchana Fel was a young woman of twenty-four. She was the fifth wife in the past ten years as the Emperor continued to try to have a male child. The one and only child of the Emperor, Princess Mariha Jana Fel, stood near her latest step mother. The two were only four years apart and, according to court gossip, were even friends. As would be expected, both were stunningly beautiful. The Queen had light blond hair arranged with diamonds and precious jewels to cascade down with her locks. The Princess had hair the color of burnished copper, interwoven with a golden string of Ithorian fire gems cascading down to her neck.

Hershied stopped on the edge of the open room with Chinlee and waited. Finally the Man at Arms announced in a booming voice, "Moff Dila Hershied, Meridian Sector, approach the throne of His Most Sublime Eminence, His Imperial Majesty Antius Huun Fel III."

"Straight back now, lass," Chinlee whispered.

Hershied couldn't help but smile at being called as lass at fifty. Her respect for the Admiral went up a notch. If she were any younger, it would have been a deadly insult. But then again if she were any younger, he would not have called her such.

She squared her back and marched with precision across the court yard. Chinlee followed a few steps behind, and then stepped off to the side as only she was directly summoned. Arriving at the foot of the steps leading to the imperial pedestal, Hershied knelt down on one knee. "It is my pleasure to answer His Imperial Majesty's summons."

Antius Fel sat up on his throne and stared down at the Mof. "We are not pleased, Moff Hershied," the Emperor announced. "Grand Moff Dinteri authorized additional forces for you to destroy this Tobin S'Artin, and yet just weeks after the destruction of the Rings, we learn that he lives still."

Dila took a long, ragged breath. This was it. There was nothing for it but to accept her fate like an officer. "Your majesty, as commander of the Sector from which S'Artin emerged as a threat, I take full responsibility for everything that has transpired. I offer my resignation in recognition of my failure to capture or kill S'Artin, and my life to you for his continued crimes against the Empire."

She bowed her head and waited. Normally when a high ranking official was executed, it was done the following day to give the official time to take care of their estate. However, there were documented cases where someone was executed on the spot.

"The court is dismissed," the Emperor said.

The startled courtiers began making their way to the two auxiliary lifts that provided exits only. Hershied did not dare move. It could be he was simply giving her the courtesy of dying in private.

When at last only the guardsmen, the Emperor and his family, and Admiral Chinlee remained, the Emperor stood from his throne. "Stand up, Hershied."

She complied but kept her eyes lowered.

"I've had five advisors tell me to cut your head off in a public ceremony," the Emperor said. "The only reason I haven't is that the Moff Council and Admiralty assure me you've done everything right."

Hershied started to speak, but then pressed her lips shut. The Emperor stared a moment. "Speak."

"Majesty, his worst actions have occurred far beyond my authority. That is the weakness of the Navy itself, and somehow he has exploited it fully. If we are to catch him, we must make a concerted, Empire-wide effort."

"As I explained, Majesty," Grand Admiral Chinlee said.

"I know, Taklon," Fel said shortly. He stalked back up the steps until he sat down. "This S'Artin is challenging the Empire directly, Hershied. He has essentially thrown the gauntlet at our feet. And I am going to answer. I have placed a ten million credit bounty on his head. And I have authorized an Empire-wide hunt for him. You, Moff Hershied, are going to lead that search."

"Majesty?" Dila said. She was barely able to contain her shock.

"But there is a price, Hershied," Fel continued. "If you succeed and bring him to me, dead or alive within one year's time, you will leave the room as a Grand Moff with your own oversector. If you fail in that time frame, you will not leave the room at all. Do you understand?"

"Absolutely, Majesty," Hershied said. "Thank you for this opportunity. I will not fail you."

"I trust not," Fel said.


	29. There Is No Coincidence

**Chapter Twenty-Nine: There Is No Coincidence  
**

It had been a year and a half now since Tobin took the _Destiny._ Looking over the surface of Dubrillion, it was astounding to consider had far he'd come.

The sky, once a murky shade of gray, was once more an aquamarine blue. The surface of the soil was already greening with new life. If not for the hulks of dead ships, it could have been as new and pure as Sestia.

Ashala Dezcartri stood beside him and admired her work. "The planet is now fully habitable. I have taken the liberty of planting shaped Kashyyyk flora for the Wookiees. The wroshyr trees will grow at an accelerated rate and be ready for habitation within five years. From there, the plants will develop at natural rates."

"Amazing," Tobin admitted. "Chabacaala tells me the air tastes good to her."

The Sekotan Vong nodded. "The World Brain must be attended to," she said. "I shall remain and see to its needs while it continues to engineer the changes. We will only consume those ships you or Admiral Fieliel feel are without purpose."

"Thank you," Tobin said.

Kilometers away, a behemoth the color of rusty blood rose from the surface of the planet with groans so load they could be heard even at the converted aquarium. It was another _Scythe_-class heavy cruiser. With a functioning four-berth shipyard and a huge dry-dock taken from the dying heart of the Rings, not to mention a quarter of a million eager Wookiees, Fieliel, Dekarta and Chabacaala were able to accelerate their repair schedule. Already the _Hubris_ was nearly complete. Tobin's old boss, Shuut, already accepted a position under Fieliel as a chief warrant officer.

"Things are going very fast for you," Dezcartri said.

Tobin blinked, having momentarily lost himself. "Yes, I suppose they are."

"How long to do you think this will last?"

"Long enough, I hope," Tobin said. "If we're found out too soon, all this will have been for nothing."

"So what next?" Dezcartri asked.

"Ordinance," Tobin said. "Hypermatter. Admiral Santari recovered as much hypermatter from the surface as possible, but we will undoubtedly need more. Newer ships have much more efficient reactors, but these old monsters guzzled the stuff. Until we're able to start producing our own, we'll need to obtain it elsewhere."

The Sekotan Vong shrugged elegantly. Though her appearance at first disturbed Tobin, he had over time learned to appreciate the unique beauty of the Vong species. "Why steal just the fish when you could steal the nets?"

Tobin grinned. "Why, Mistress Dezcartri, you are becoming more like a pirate every day."

She chose not to share her view of that idea.

Two weeks later, Fleet Admiral Silmari and Captains Shindo Bard and Sor'ai Soonta stepped into Tobin's office on the planet surface. The office once housed the administrator of the Dubrillion Aquarium, and provided a stunning view to the quickly greening world that once had been utterly destroyed.

"Please have a seat," Tobin said. He held up a holopad. "This is Sula's estimate of our hypermatter stores. After recovering everything we could from the surface and the Rings, we have about six months' worth of hypermatter for our existing ships. If we wish to introduce additional ships, that timeframe goes down quickly. I've meditated on this, and I believe I have an answer."

He activated a holographic map over his desk. The map zoomed past star clusters and nebulas until it settled on a gas giant on the far side of the galaxy. "Bespin?" Silmari asked.

Sor'ai, however, nodded. "The hypermatter facility," she said.

Tobin nodded. "Not to mention a generous supply of Tibanna gas. We'll need both. More importantly, it is a civilian operation under Imperial contract. It is lightly defended since, in essence, it's a refueling station for both civilian and military ships."

"Do you know how big one of those things is?" Sor'ai said. "It is as large as an orbital defense platform. It has to extract the tachyonic material through a hyperspace accelerator. And it may not be heavily defended, but it is large enough to ensure that what defenses are available have plenty of time to react."

"True, but those hyperdrive accelerators can also be used as functional hyperdrives," Tobin said. "We could simply fly it out."

"It has a permanent staff of almost twenty thousand," Sor'ai pointed out. She looked around and felt her cheeks darken with a flush. "My father worked on one for a few years after I was born."

Tobin nodded. "No, I appreciate the feedback. We'll need to know everything we can. You see, the Force is urging me to go to Bespin. So, I am going to scout out the location personally. Silmari, I'm placing you in charge here. Sor'ai, you and Shindo are going to command the _Destiny_ and _Sword of Stars_ for this mission. One way or the other, I want that production facility. Dismissed."

Shindo and Sor'ai nodded and left, leaving Silmari lingering. She turned to him. "There are others who would do better as your admiral. Malnick, for one. I have never commanded. Why me?"

Tobin stood and stepped around the desk until he stood facing her. Devaronian females did not allow touching lightly by anyone, much less those not of the same species, so Tobin made no effort to touch. Instead, he merely smiled. "I chose you because I trust you above all others. If I asked you to pull your weapon and kill Shindo, would you?"

"Yes," Silmari shrugged. "My mate and I have taken an oath to serve you. It is our way."

"Sor'ai would not have," Tobin said. "Nor could I have asked her to. I believe she is loyal to me, but there are some things that her conscience would not allow her to do. As much as I envy her that freedom, I cannot afford the luxury of morality. And I need someone as my second who understands that. It may be others could make better command decisions, but none would be as loyal as you, nor as able to do what needs to be done. So, no matter how high I may go, I will always keep you close to me."

A human being accused of not having morality would have been deeply offended. Human morality, however, was irrelevant to Devaronians. What mattered to them, above all, was loyalty. Essentially, by saying she was most loyal, Tobin was confirming in Silmari's mind that she was the most important person in his organization.

She nodded with a toothy grin, and walked out content. A moment later, Tobin commed Malnick. The newly promoted commodore nodded. "What can I do for you, Grand Moff?" she asked with only a hint of irony regarding his title.

"Chiala Antias from the old_ Hubris _crew. She's begun your courses. What do you think?"

Malnick shrugged and then pulled a strand of black hair from her eyes. She looked very professional in the Imperial uniform she wore. Only the two shoulder patches bearing crossed lightsabers marked her apart from the actual Imperial Navy.

"She's had technical training already. She admitted she was being groomed for a leadership role on her old ship. Smart. Level-headed. Too timid."

Tobin nodded. "I'm going out with Captains Sor'ai and Bard on a mission. I want Chiala under Sor'ai's command as a bridge officer."

Malnick nodded. "I'll get her transferred," the commander said.

Tobin nodded in satisfaction as he set up the training for the next set of captains. She was young, still, but he foresaw a great future for her if she was willing to take it.

Before he could say any more, Aaris stepped into the office. "This place is so wizard!"

"Have you and your mom settled in?"

Months ago, the young boy would never have accepted the idea of a Twi'lek being his mom. But the months spent with Shindo and his new wife Soola Bard had been very good for Aaris. For the first time in his life he had a genuinely loving home, a steady school environment, and a master teaching him Jedi meditation techniques.

As far as he was concerned, Soola was his mother.

"So are you going to run with me?" Aaris asked.

Tobin looked over his schedule, but quickly realized he would never have time if he did not make it for himself. He buzzed his Ulician assistant to hold his schedule and stood. "Yes, I am. And then we'll see how your sparring has come."

~~Last Jedi~~

~~Last Jedi~~

Tobin's shuttle landed on a large platform on the north side of the city.

The head of state and grand moff of Sestis III was dressed in a pair of casual slacks and a white shirt with a black spacer's vest that matched his slacks. Beside him, Shindo Bard wore his old spacer's clothes. In the body of the shuttle, one of Kenth Shandor's more trusted lieutenants sat with twenty of his close friends in an image of casual relaxation.

For this trip Tobin was going by the name of Lando Sart. Given his love of history and the location, he thought it amusing to bear that name in Bespin. He and Shindo stepped out onto the platform with their men and were immediately met by a city lobot and ten city guards.

The guards eyed the twenty men with Tobin nervously.

The lobot, a cyborg human slaved to the city, did not appeared to care. "Lando Sart, of the Sestia Public Energy Consortium." She read from the holopad using information Tobin provided when they requested a landing berth. "Please state the purpose of your visit today?"

"We are interested in obtaining hypermatter, and possible production facilities as well," Tobin said. "Our world is experiencing a mild energy issue that we are not ready to disclose to Imperial authorities at present."

Worlds that were forced to petition the Empire for basic needs quickly lost local administrative control. His request was not only reasonable, but was in fact becoming increasingly common.

"Understood," she said. She handed him a data card. "I've loaded the contact information for a representative of the Energy Production Consortium here. I show she has an appointment available tomorrow at ten hundred hours. Is that acceptable?" The lobot was nothing if not efficient.

"Very, thank you."

"The card also contains the location of suitable quarters for your stay. We have deposited your credits accordingly."

It took more than a few of Tobin's "liberated" credits to get them quarters and credibility. "Very good. Thank you for your assistance."

The lobot and her guards turned and led them into the city itself.

Cloud City was an institution. It celebrated two and a half millennia of business just last year. However, looking at the bright arches, clean halls and beautifully maintained gardens, Tobin would never have guessed the city's age. What he saw was a wealthy trading post and energy production facility.

He and Shindo split up, with the majority of the men going with Shindo. The former pirate was skilled at making his way through spaceports. Tobin did not have experience, but let the Force guide him as he moved from shop to shop. Something hung in the air, a tension that made his stomach tingle. The Force warned of important events, but he could not sense any danger directed at him.

The night passed and morning arrived quickly. He and Shindo left the majority of their men behind in their spacious suite as they went to their appointment. The men were busy assembling the blasters so carefully hidden in their luggage. After all, it was illegal for Imperial citizens to carry arms.

The data card told them they would be meeting with a human woman named Sandal Tierri. When they arrived at the Consortium officers, however, they were told that Mrs. Tierri was unavoidable detained.

They instead met with a narrow-faced Muun attorney who, while happy with the thought of money, was less happy with the thought of selling a hypermatter production station. "Such an item has a cost of several hundred billion credits," the Muun said. "Without significant corporate backing, very few worlds can afford such a station."

"Would your organization be willing to enter into a production agreement?" Tobin asked. As they spoke, he gently reached out with the Force until he had a feel for the other's mind.

"We of course are willing to entertain such an agreement," the Muun said. "Bulk discounts are available, however transportation would be your responsibility. And I've looked, but I do not find Sestia III in our star charts. Where exactly is it?"

"Far, far away," Tobin said with a smile. "Transport would be a logistics issue." He chose that moment to take firm control of their host. "Tell me, honored sir, why was Mrs. Tierri unable to meet with us today?"

Shindo tried not to look startled.

The Muun blinked. "Her husband has been taken into Imperial Custody," he said. "He altered official records. She was under questioning but was released to her home."

"Altering records for whom?"

"Their two children were born abnormal and are scheduled for termination tomorrow morning. Sandal and her husband will be required to watch the executions before he is placed in a penal facility for life."

Tobin released his grip. "Thank you for your time, Honored Sir. I will have our barrister contact you regarding the details of a possible production agreement."

"I look forward to that," the Muun said without any indication of the questioning.

As they left the officers of the energy consortium, Tobin was quiet. Shindo respected that silence, as did the sergeant following them. Finally, though, the former pirate and stout Unitarian said, "That's why the Force brought you here, isn't it?"

Tobin nodded, his mind whirling around memories of that terrible day years ago, when a man told him he was going to die for something he had no control over.

"We're going to save them, I take it?" Shindo asked.

"Oh yes," Tobin said. "And maybe more than that."

A discreet inquiry at a street café computer terminal provided the residence of Danton and Sandal Tierri. "Shindo," Tobin said before he left, "get back to the suite and let Sor'ai know what is happening. Ask her to get her crew ready. We're going to be departing in a hurry tomorrow, and there is a very good chance that we will be taking the hypermatter station with us. Also, I want a second shuttle standing by—preferable a civilian hopper. Something small and unremarkable."

Shindo blinked. "Really?"

"The Force guides my steps," Tobin said. "What are the odds of discovering that the point of contact for the largest hypermatter production facility in this sector has two Force-sensitive children scheduled for execution? I was meant to come here, Shindo. Go, now."

The captain nodded, and Tobin began walking toward the nearest turbolift.

The Tierri residence was located in one of the more fashionable rings of the city. The halls were immaculate, with small shops scattered haphazardly among the residences. However, when Tobin reached the hall near the Tierri's home he immediately spotted two troopers standing guard.

He debated a direct confrontation, but realized it was not time yet. So he sank deeply into the Force, merging both Jedi and Sith techniques until he was nearly invisible. It wasn't so much that he could not be seen, but that no one's eyes could or wanted to latch onto him.

A simple compulsion had both troopers rush to a nearby shop to check for a potential threat, and Tobin reached the door. It was unlocked, and he let himself in.

Sandal Tierri was an attractive woman in her early forties who stood staring out a wall-sized window at the swirling pink and white clouds of a Bespin morning. She wore crumpled slacks and a blouse that looked slept in, and her unkempt hair reinforced the impression that she had fallen asleep fully clothed, and not slept for long.

"Mrs. Tierri," Tobin said.

She spun around quickly. She had an oval face, with a petite nose and graceful eyebrows set above dark eyes. "Who are you? Why won't you people just leave me alone?"

Tobin took a step closer. "I'm here, Mrs. Tierri, because eleven years ago, an Imperial magistrate walked into my school and read a proclamation that I was to be executed for being an 'abnormal.' I escaped, and I have vowed to help any I can avoid that fate. I'm here to help you."

She snorted even as she wiped a tear away. "That damned magistrate sent you, didn't he? You couldn't prove I was involved and now you want to entice me to commit treason. You needn't have bothered. If I'd known, I would have done the same thing Danton did. Stupid fool doesn't realize that shielding me doesn't make a difference if I lose everything. So just get out!"

Tobin gently lifted her with the Force, and levitated her until she stood before him. Her eyes widened as she gasped.

"I will tell you a secret," Tobin said. "There are no Abnormals. Your children are Force sensitive, and with training could become very powerful. I will save them, and you and your husband as well if I can. But there is something I need. I need the access and command codes for the hypermatter station. All of them. I need to know how to deactivate the production facility for transport, and then how to fly it."

"Oh, is that all you want?" she snarled. "I know what you are now. You're a thief! You're using my children as bargaining chips for that station."

"I'm going to save your children no matter what," Tobin said. "The station is simply a bonus. I do need it if I'm going to stop the Empire from murdering other children like yours."

"Who are you?"

"I am Tobin Solo Fel Artin."

"The pirate?" she gasped, backing away. "There is a ten million credit bounty on your head!" she said.

"Really?" Tobin said thoughtfully. "Hmm, might be useful if we need some quick funds. But, you're not really interested in the bounty, are you?"

She wiped her nose with the back of her hand and sobbed. "You really will save my children?"

"I swear to you," he said. "I won't save them to coerce you to help me. I will save them because the Force compels me to. But if you can help me, then I beg of you to do so."

"Get us all out," she finally said, "and I'll get you everything you need."

~~Last Jedi~~

~~Last Jedi~~

Despite common belief, Lobot was not without some free will. Once, she was a young, happy woman in love with a man she thought loved her back. But she was not ready for a family. When she discovered her lover had counter-acted her contraceptive and they had conceived a child, she reacted badly and terminated the pregnancy. She was only nineteen, and he was almost forty.

Unfortunately, her lover was the Imperial Magistrate of Bespin, and she was quickly accused of a non-consensual abortion. He then added additional charges to the list until she was facing a lifetime sentence on an asteroid mining colony that had a regular 48% mortality rate among new prisoners.

The other option was partial lobotomy and cyborg implants. The implants ensured she had to do what she was commanded, and that she would remain slaved to the city for the remainder of her life, but the process allowed her to retain some independent thought, even if she could not completely act upon those thoughts.

Lobot immediately recognized the face of Tobin S'Artin, as Imperial records were regularly uploaded into her mind. She was obligated to report his presence. However, the orders did not specify immediate notification. Such was implied and expected, but not explicitly ordered. Therefore, following the letter of her standing orders, Lobot added a line in her weekly report that she spotted the most wanted criminal in the galaxy on Bespin and sent it off at its regular time a day later.

The moment the report was transmitted to the Data Clearinghouse in the nearest holonet node, a dedicated droid brain quickly sifted through the report, and in less than ten nanoseconds located the single line in the report. The droid immediately alerted the local command in the nearby Anoat System, which then forwarded the information to the newly formed task force under the command of one Moff Dila Hershied.

~~Last Jedi~~

~~Last Jedi~~

Even the Emperor realized that the public execution of children, usually no more than a few weeks old, would have quickly swung the unsteady pendulum of public opinion. Therefore, the execution of abnormal children was done discretely, with the only ones in attendance being the parents.

In acknowledgement of the unpleasant task at hand, the execution method was actually quite humane by Imperial standards. There were three active agents with timed releases via hypospray. The first sank the accused deep into a peaceful, dreamless sleep. The second followed quickly and paralyzed all muscles in the body. The third stopped the heart.

The mixture was calculated for each species, taking into account age, weight and genetic disposition. Normally the child was dead within ten seconds. For the babies, it was merciful, or so Magistrate Grandiet thought to himself as he escorted his two latest criminals into the room. However, even Grandiet had to admit the older children felt a certain trauma knowing they were being led to their deaths. It was, he believed, why penalizing the parents was so important. Parents had to understand how much better it was to kill the abnormals while they were still babies, so as to avoid the trauma the older children faced now.

Dantila and Delton Tierri were clearly traumatized as two troopers forcibly strapped them into the execution chairs. Each chair was reclined at a roughly forty-five degree angle and heavily padded for comfort. The hypospray nozzles were not visible, and emerged from behind the seats to inject from the back of the neck only after the subjects were secured. That way, the older children never saw it coming and so had less terror to anticipate. By the time they realized it had begun, it would already be over.

A shame, really. Dantila was thirteen and already showing some of her mother's beauty. Grandiet was no pedophile. He always waited until his companions were of legal age. Five more years, and she would have been perfect. Her eleven-year-old brother looked too much like his father, though.

The Magistrate removed the holopad from his robe pockets. "Dantila and Delton Tierri, for genetic abnormalities detrimental to the well being of the Empire, you are both hereby sentenced to death. This sentence is not carried out lightly, and to ensure no undo pain is felt, the method of execution will be lethal hypospray, to be carried out this day, by order of His Imperial Majesty, Emperor Antius Huun Fel III."

"Please," Dantila cried, "where's my mother?"

Grandiet said nothing, pocketed the holopad, and stepped out of the chamber. He walked around the corner until he stood beside Danton and Sandal Tierri, with two troopers directly behind them. They stared directly through an opaque window that allowed the children to see their parents as well. It was important, Grandiet thought, for the parents to be looking into the eyes of children who should have been killed years ago.

Danton was weeping openly, a low moan burning in the back of his throat. Beside him, his wife's face was devoid of all emotion. The only feature in front of them was a single button. That button meant the death of their children.

Suddenly the door to the chamber opened, and a man walked in. He appeared young, with raven-black hair with an occasional highlight of red, and a set of deep, piercing blue eyes. He very calmly walked to the two tables with the crying children, and reached behind each head until his hands re-emerged with the hypospray canisters.

"I don't believe we'll murder any children today, Magistrate," the stranger said to the one-way mirror.

Grandiet turned to one of the troopers. "Take that fool into custody."

The trooper jogged around the corner and emerged into the room almost immediately. The newcomer simply lifted a hand, and the trooper suddenly stopped, gasping. Through the speakers they could hear an audible _crack_. The trooper fell dead to the ground.

Grandiet suddenly understood. "S'Artin!"

A lightsaber ignited in flight, flashing through the plain glass window, to impale itself in the center of the magistrate's face. The trooper responded with predictable speed, but before he could fire of a shot found himself pulled through the now shattered glass. He hit the wall with bone-crushing Force. The lightsaber tore out of the magistrate's head back into Tobin's hand, where he deactivated it and hung it from his belt. Just like that, it was over.

"S'Artin?" Danton Tierri whispered.

Tobin smiled, then turned to the children. "I've been where you are now," he told them both, lingering over Dantila. "I won't let that happen to you." He waved a hand and their restraints fell away. By then, Sandal was already in the room with both her children held in a desperate embrace.

"You're Tobin S'Artin," Danton said.

"I am," Tobin admitted. "And I'm here to save you and your family. Come, now!"


	30. The Bespin Gambit

Review responses for Chap 29 are in my forums. There were a lot of reviews-thank you all so much for reading. Please also note a very rough Dramatis Personae has been posted in the Last Jedi forum as well.

Thank you.

* * *

**Chapter Thirty: The Bespin Gambit**

The execution chamber was buried deeply within the Imperial administrative officers. As they stepped out into the room, the Tierris were stunned at the sheer amount of destruction around them. Dead troopers littered the floor, while civilian administrative employees huddled in a corner. They saw Tobin and one bit off a scream.

"How come we couldn't hear any of this?" Sandal asked.

"The execution chambers are sound-proofed," Tobin said, glaring at the civilians. "So no one is bothered by the sound of screaming, terrified children. Come on, we don't have much time. The city security net does not have access to the Imperial suite, but as soon as we leave I'm sure they'll trigger an alert."

"Are you going to kill the people here?" Sandal asked, her voice again devoid of emotion.

"I'm trying to limit the number of civilian casualties," Tobin said. "What use is trying to save the system from itself if everyone in it hates me? Come on. Sandal, you know what to do."

Mrs. Tierri nodded and left her stunned children and husband with Tobin.

"Where's she going?"

"Your fate is tied to mine," Tobin said. "And my fate would be aided immeasurably by a hypermatter production station."

His comlink beeped at him. "This is S'Artin."

"Grand Moff," Sor'ai's voice said, "I am tracking heavy hyperspace traffic en route to Bespin. I monitored open channels and it appears that a taskforce has been established dedicated to your capture. Looks like a good part of that task force is coming."

"Understood," Tobin said. "I've got inside help with the hypermatter station. Be ready for a tactical jump."

"We're going to take on a task force?"

"Only long enough to distract them," he said. With a grin he added, "I like your ship too much to risk loosing it."

The Twi'lek's amused snort was the last thing audible before Tobin terminated the connection. He turned to the two kids. Though not as strong in the Force as he or even Aaris, he sensed both had a great potential. Their parents, however, had none. It was as he suspected. Bereft of genetically inclined Force sensitives, the Force responded by touching those who had no family history at all.

"Come on!"

They met Shindo in another street café. All twenty of Tobin's men were spread across the tables in a casual manner. "Captain," Tobin said. "Please meet Dantila, Delton and Danton Tierri."

"Got a thing for the 'D's now, do we?" Shindo said to Danton. "Come along, please."

The inevitable chose that moment to happen. The garrison of troopers, alerted to the infiltration of the Imperial administrative suite, came pouring down the hall with a cadre of city militia a step behind them.

Instantly, Shandor's men lost all appearance of relaxation, dropped to their knees and started firing their smuggled carbines.

To Tobin's trained eye, he saw immediate differences in the two forces. The troopers underwent a three year training regimen that in the end had them sharpened to a fine point, and continued to have extensive refresher training every three months thereafter. Shandor's men were mostly Baroli colonists, Unitarians and pirates with essentially a year's training as raiders on the _Destiny_ before the more formalized military training.

They were the best Shandor had to offer, but were still out-classed by the heavily armed and armored troopers.

"Fall back," Tobin ordered. Around the troopers came flying discs. "'Ware the assault droids!"

The men, already falling back and loosing numbers, cracked a little as they came under assault from the flying droids. Tobin unleashed a bolt of Force lightning that destroyed two of the machines and allowed them to retreat down the halls toward their shuttle pad.

"What are the chances they'll have our shuttle pad cut off?" Shindo asked.

"I'd say the chances were good," Tobin said. "That's not going to stop me."

They had the last nine of their men in the running battle, with Shindo making sure to stay close to the Tierris. Finally, they reached the hall leading to their shuttle. Naturally, a squad of ten troopers, five hover droids and twenty city guards waited for them.

"Hold here," Tobin ordered. He turned, and ran toward the forces attempting to trap them in the city.

To the Tierris, it looked as if their strange rescuer simply disappeared. Troopers, droids and guards fired at the spot where he was last, but their shots hit nothing but walls. Suddenly they saw a flash of motion above the soldiers, and a hovering droid exploded as a glowing red blade cut it in half. Another fell under a blue blade, and then another and another until the droids were gone.

All they saw were blurs of motion.

Then troopers and guards started screaming in alarm as a blur swept through them like a storm. Sparks of blue lightning speared soldiers, others screamed as red or blue blades sliced through their bodies. Others simply flew across the hall to impact nearby walls with lethal speed.

In just under a minute, the ambush force was gone. Tobin appeared again by the door and motioned for them to come.

"Wow," Dantila said. "Dad, do you think I could do something like that some day?"

Danton Tierri didn't know how to respond as he and his children ran to the door. They emerged onto the landing platform just in time to see Tobin wave a hand and send four more troopers plummeting off the edge into the endless depths of the city below. The shuttle was huge and ornate, looking much like that of an Ithorian luxury liner.

They ran around it entirely to a small, non-descript jitney. Tobin paused at the entrance and turned to Shindo. "You know what to do?"

The old Corellian pirate grinned. "Yep." They all turned as overhead, Imperial fighters dotted the sky. "That's going to be a problem," Shindo noted. Already a pair of fighters appeared to have broken off from the formation overhead and flew straight at the platform.

Tobin shrugged. "What 'till I'm gone."

Tobin left the Tierris with Shindo and ran back to the large, immaculate shuttle. He settled quickly in the pilot's seat just as a pair of approaching fighters unleashed a pair of missiles. Somehow, the missiles tipped over mid-flight. The fighters impacted the warheads of their own missiles a second later and exploded.

"They should know better," Tobin muttered as they brought the shuttle up. Another pair of fighters approached. Tobin drew deeply in the Force and threw not an attack at the pilots, but a vision. A vision of a shuttle full of men and two children.

As soon as he could feel the pilots reporting in that the shuttle contained all the fugitives, he lifted off and immediately dove down between the sparkling towards of the city.

~~Last Jedi~~

~~Last Jedi~~

Sandal Tierri sat quietly as the Consortium shuttle flew her over to the platform.

As the vice president of production Sandal served not only as the point contact for prospective clients, but she also had an intrinsic knowledge of the hypermatter production facility itself. She was in fact one of the engineers who oversaw its construction in the Kuat Drive Years fifteen years ago, where she met her husband.

She flew the platform along with an Imperial frigate as escort to its new home at Bespin, and accepted permanent employment with the Consortium, where she excelled and climbed up the ranks. She and Danton loved the cloud city, and spent many nights on their balcony looking over the breathtaking cloudscapes.

Both their children were conceived on that balcony.

She fought to keep the tears at bay. She was not alone on the shuttle; around her other employees gave her a respectful distance. The news of her children's arrest was essentially common knowledge. Her official innocence was as well.

She knew at this moment Tobin S'Artin was herding her family through the halls of the city that had been her home for much of her adult life. He was leading them away from the only home her children had ever known, for the hope that they could live to make another.

When he told her his needs and his plan, and that her children were to be rescued no matter what, she loved him at that moment more intensely even than her own husband. She knew without any introspection that she would do anything for him—even die—so long as her children could be saved.

The shuttle landed and Sandal immediately made her way to the exit, and the platform beyond. The landing bay was large enough for a transport only. Being early in the morning the shifts were still changing. It was the best time for what she had planned.

The control center of the platform was actually as far from the center of the station as possible, on an exposed nub of transparisteel. She stepped into the room and saw that only two others were still on duty, both younger employees who nodded at her when she came in.

"Sol, Tani, can you come here please?" she asked as she entered.

Both nodded and came. After all, she was their penultimate boss, answering only to the consortium's president and board of directors. When they were close enough, she pulled two rods out and held each one in a hand. "Do you know what these are?"

"Are those stun rods?" Tani asked with a quizzical expression on her young face.

"They are," Sandal said, before shoving a rod into each of their chests. They dropped like rocks. "I'm sorry, kids," she said.

She moved to the primary control station. "Attend," she said.

"Acknowledged," the three droid intelligences that ran the platform said.

"Initiate Directive 99847-_Thesh-Thesh_."

"Please confirm Directive and authorization."

"Confirm, Directive 99847-_ Thesh-Thesh._ Personal authorization, Sandal Tierri, _Onith-Vev-_554556-_Trill-Zerek_."

"Authorization confirmed, commencing full reactor shut down and emergency evacuation procedures." Overhead, the lights turned red and alarms began blaring. "All control interfaces are locked pending further orders."

"Initiate drive cold start."

"Acknowledged, Director Tierri," the droid voices said.

"And begin venting the hypermatter."

"Director, that action is a direct violation of consortium safety regulations and Imperial law."

"I understand. The order is under my personal authority. Vent the hypermatter."

"Acknowledged."

~~Last Jedi~~

~~Last Jedi~~

Moff Dila Hershied sat on the edge of her chair in the center of the frigate command deck. On the holographic display before her, the twelve other ships of her taskforce flew in perfect formation as they plowed through hyperspace at the fastest speed available. Frigates may not have been the size of ancient star destroyers, but with advances in hyperspace technology they were much, much faster. They could cross the galaxy in a week. Or a sector in a matter of hours.

"Why Bespin?" she asked.

"Tibanna gas, hypermatter." Captain Davin Lostrin, newly promoted by Dila's own hand, stood nearby as he answered her rhetorical question.

"Think bigger," she said. "We're discussing a man who abducted over hundreds of thousands of slaves from right under our noses, and who outright stole a ship yard. What does a man with a shipyard need?"

"Hypermatter?"

Davin's eyes widened as he realized what she was saying. "You think he's going to try and steal the hypermatter platform?"

"When we emerge from hyperspace, half the task force is to secure the hypermatter reactor. The other half is to engage any of S'Artin's ships in orbit. So far we know he has at least two." She gazed ahead at the swirling tunnel of hyperspace, urging their ship to go faster. He was so close she could almost taste his blood on her lips.

~~Last Jedi~~

~~Last Jedi~~

Despite training by both a Dark Lord of the Sith and a Jedi Knight, Tobin did not consider himself a natural pilot. However, with the Force guiding his actions he was able to fly through the gleaming towers of Bespin with a sure hand, while a swarm of militia cloud cars and Imperial fighters attempted to follow.

On the other side of the city, a non-descript jitney rose into the air on a pre-assigned course to one of the many floating spas. It followed every regulation of speed and course until it left the immediate air space control of the city. Then it tipped its nose, applied what meager power it had, and shot into orbit.

Still in the city, Tobin spun the ungainly shuttle between gleaming spires of transparisteel and watched with satisfaction as one of the fighters clipped an edge of the tower and spun out of control. More were coming, though. He pulled up on the shuttle's nose and applied the full power of its thrusters.

The Ithorian luxury shuttle might have been ungainly, but it most certainly did not lack for power. The craft shot straight up, pushing Tobin deep into seat despite the powerful internal compensators. Immediately all the fighters left their search patterns over the city and converged behind him. The cloud cars sent by the city militia broke off as they were not well equipped for exo-atmospheric flight.

As soon as he left the atmosphere, Tobin began taking fire from the many star fighters behind him. He reached out in the Force to confirm his targets, then with deliberate calm pulled a jury-rigged switch from the pilot's cup holder and pressed the button.

The shuttle's rear cargo hatch opened and a torpedo warhead tumbled free into the low-gravity of the extreme upper atmosphere of the planet. The fighters were so close they had little time to react as the torpedo exploded into a huge field of glowing blue energy.

Half the fighters swept through the field and lost all power. Immediately, they began to drift freely for a few moments before they began to slowly fall back into the roiling atmosphere of the gas giant. The other fighters took advantage of a few seconds warning and veered out of the way of the field, only to be met by vintage Twintail Alliance starfighters not seen in flight in hundreds of years.

Tobin couldn't hide his grin as the old star fighters ripped into the surprised Imperial fighters. Despite their age, the old Alliance fighters performed remarkably well, and easily punched a hole through the ragged Imperial forces.

Ahead, Tobin could see the _Destiny_ taking position behind the massive production platform. "This is going to be tight," Tobin said to himself.

The whole cockpit suddenly lit up with warning lights and buzzing alarms. Just a few thousand clicks away, six Imperial frigates and six corvettes reverted to real space going just under sub-light speed.

"Maybe a little too tight!" Tobin muttered. He hit the com. "This is S'Artin. All friendlies back to _Destiny_ now!" He switched frequencies. Out in space, half of the Imperial ships were heading right toward the platform.

The other six capital ships were gunning directly for him. Swarms of fighters launched as streaks of green approached. "That's not good," he muttered. "Where is Shindo's ship?"

The six Imperial ships approaching the hypermatter reactor must have detected the presence of the _Destiny_ just off its aft. The capital ships maneuvered away from each other to shoot around the precious platform.

That's when the Imperials detected the threat. "Moff Hershied," Captain Lostrin said, "we're detecting massive amounts of free-floating hypermatter around the platform. It looks like S'Artin's forces have somehow caused it to vent its storage units."

"Order all ships to hold fire!" Hershied said.

The order was quickly relayed, however the captains of the individual ships had already made the determination that firing into a massive cloud of hypermatter could have had disastrous results. Her orders merely confirmed their own.

"Get a definite map of the disbursement radius," Hershied ordered. "In the meantime, I want that shuttle!"

Just then, the thousand meter-long behemoth _Sword of Stars_ dropped into real space like an arrow shot directly into the heart of Moff Hershied's formation of ships. As proximity alarms went off across the five other ships around hers, Dila looked at the holographic display and ground her teeth. "All fighters stay on the shuttle. Capital ships bring the cannons to bear on that new ship!"

Shindo Bard's ship, under the temporary command of his son Haslo, did not wait. From the durasteel dome that was once a clear window over a ballroom, the ship's superlaser fired a single destructive beam of energy at one of the frigates. It was not Hershied's personal command. The single shot was so powerful it ripped the frigate clean in half and continued into space beyond it. Moments later secondary explosions finished the already dead ship off.

Without pause, all the secondary batteries of the _Sword of Stars_ opened up while the main superlaser recharged its capacitors.

The six Imperial ships tasked with defending the hypermatter reactor finished the process of mapping out the disbursement radius of the deadly material and began positioning themselves accordingly.

On board the _Destiny_, Sor'ai Soonta realized that, just through sheer force of numbers, she was about to lose her ship. Even with the considerable assistance of the _Sword of Stars_, there was no way two ships could hold off an entire Imperial taskforce.

Sor'ai made a snap command decision. "Fire a single torpedo directly into the hypermatter cloud," she ordered.

Ensign Chiala Antias stared up at her in shock. "Sir? That could destroy the platform."

"Better it than us," Soonta said. "Do it."

Chiala relayed the command to her crew of three specialists and a single proton torpedo launched.

In the shuttle, Tobin sensed a flare of danger from the Force. Not even his eyes could see a single torpedo fired in the distances of space, but the shuttles sensors saw it for him. "What is Sor'ai doing?" he growled.

Tobin hit the communications controls. "S'Artin to Mother, are you there?"

Sandal Tierri's voice sounded strained. "I'm here."

"Get that platform moving now!"

"I'm trying," she said. "The hyperdrive reactors were in cold storage. It's taking forever."

"Use positioning thrusters!"

"They don't have the power!"

At that very moment, tractor beams from the _Destiny_ latched onto the rear of the platform. The frigate was barely a tenth the size of the platform, and yet once the inertia was overcome, the whole platform began moving.

Seconds later the torpedo's proximity warhead ignited in the middle of the cloud of hypermatter.

Hypermatter was the most volatile, exotic form of matter known in the galaxy. It was pulled directly from another phase of space-time as a tachyon-like material that, when annihilated in a matter-hypermatter reactor, resulted in an unimaginable burst of energy several times the output of an ordinary star. A proton torpedo warhead fused protons together into heavy subatomic particles in an uncontrolled reaction that resulted in megaton through isoton-level explosions. This explosion of subatomic particles impacted with the tachyon-like exotic material of the hypermatter floating in the near vacuum of space with predictable results.

"By the Force," Tobin muttered.

"By my father's left nut," Dila Hershied muttered.

"That's not good," Sor'ai Soonta whimpered.

The cascading billows of destructive energy did not take the form of fire. Fire was far too mundane—a chemical reaction requiring an atmosphere. No, what they saw were sheets of plasma energy cascading through space with unimagineable power. The cascades of plasma washed over and annihilated the shields of two of the closer corvettes and quickly burned through their hulls to destroy them instantly. A frigate was lost as well, though the two other frigates and lone corvette were sufficiently shielded and distant to survive.

The plasma impacted the emergency shields of the now emptied hypermatter reactor as well, burning through the outer storage compartments. However, the accelerator used to obtain the hypermatter was itself so sufficiently shielded that the rest of the platform was protected, as was the _Destiny_ behind it.

The plasma reaction was not specific to the cloud, however. Without any type of medium to conduct or contain it, the plasma cascade burst out like the debris of a nova among all ships in orbit. Tobin desperately turned the shuttle around and accelerated to try and ride the wave. The Twintail fighters around him broke formation to try and weave through the approaching death as best they could.

The ships engaged in the _Sword of Stars_, and the _Sword_ herself shuddered under the terrible impact of the reaction. All ships in orbit over the planet Bespin were hit by the sheets of cascading plasma.

In the shuttle, Tobin fought for control as he pushed the engines beyond their maximum thrust capabilities. The plasma cascade was so close the thrust radiation was merging with that of the plasma itself. He was beginning to lose vectored thrust ability as the thrusters—designed to channel the heat of a fusion reaction—began to melt.

Suddenly Tobin felt a surge from the Force and followed it without hesitation. He banked the shuttle hard to port and poured on everything it had. The warning indicators told him he was about to lose his sublight engines, but he pushed anyway.

The expanding sheets of plasma started to drift apart, and it was through a seam in two massive sheets of destructive energy that Tobin managed to weave the shuttle. The fit was still so tight, however, that he watched as one entire wing and two thruster bells simply disappeared as the cascade swept by them.

Suddenly the ride was over. Tobin brought the sublight engines down to a much lower output and slowly brought the ship back around to the _Destiny_. After a sensor sweep, he could not detect a single fighter still in space.

However, as soon as the shock passed, Tobin realized they were not out of the fight yet. He brought the engines back up, only to be answered with a whine. He looked down in alarm and checked through all systems. The ship's thrusters were gone, literally razed by the plasma sheets. One airfoil was gone, and the ship's hyperdrive system was shorted out by the super-charged EM field produced by the cascade. If not for the shuttle's shielding, he himself would have been vaporized just from the initial radiation burst.

He was dead in space.

The _Sword of Stars_ was listing dangerously. Even from his distance he could see flares of damage. The Imperials also took damage, but because of the way they split their forces, four ships remained intact and functioning. Two of those ships were already setting a course for him. The other two immediately began to fire on the damaged _Sword of Stars._

Tobin reached through the Force. He was alone, and the Imperials were already closer to him than any of his people could get.

Suddenly all channels tuned out and another voice spoke again. "I am Moff Dila Hershied. I am addressing Tobin S'Artin."

Tobin merely shrugged and hit the responding channel. "Moff Hershied, I hope you're doing well today," he said with forced calm.

Through the canopy of the shuttle he could see the _Sword_ pulling away from the two ships pounding on its weakening shields. Those ships began to pursue, but Haslo Bard began firing his Ion missiles from the converted luxury liner. Without active shields, the Imperial ships were ill prepared for the effects of the weapons.

"I am doing well, thank you for your concern," came the cultured response. She had a Core accent, Tobin noted. Probably either of noble birth or heavy education, or both. "Do you honestly think we're going to let you take a hypermatter reactor?"

"Let? Certainly not. Stop? Highly unlikely."

"You are a very confident young man."

"I'm told it's one of my many failings," Tobin said.

"I wanted to speak to you today so you would know who your enemy is," Hershied continued. "The Emperor has personally tasked me with bringing you to justice. If I fail, it is my own life that is lost."

Tobin switched a side-channel on a secure frequency to the _Destiny. _"Sor'ai," he said, "has Shindo come aboard?"

"He has. Admiral, I'm sorry, I had no…."

"It doesn't matter any more," Tobin said. "The shuttle's dead in the water. Get our people out. Silmari's in over all command, Malnick is in command of military forces for now. When you get back, there is a cube in my personal quarters. I want you to give it my apprentice, and make sure he shares it with the to the Tierri children. It is a Jedi holocron."

"Moff…Tobin…"

"This is my final order until I am free again. You and the Sestia navy are charged with doing everything you can to save children deemed as abnormal by the Empire. That is your standing order, Captain. Do you understand?"

The silence over the channel hung heavily. Finally, she said, "Yes, Moff S'Artin. May the Force be with you."

The ghost of a smile touched his lips. "And with you, Captain."

He flicked the side channel closed.

"Mr. S'Artin, I sense you are ignoring me," came the voice of Moff Hershied.

"Not at all, Admiral," Tobin lied.

Just then, the hypermatter production platform seemed to stretch a moment before disappearing into hyperspace. The _Destiny_ seemed somehow alone and vulnerable under the approach of the Imperial task force. It spun about and with a flash of its drives disappeared as well.

The _Sword of Stars_, seeing its own objective moving away, blurred into hyperspace a second before a shower of missiles passed through where it would have been.

"Congratulations, Moff Hershied," Tobin said as he settled back into the seat of the shuttle. "It appears you are going to live."

The two frigates now loomed beyond Tobin's cockpit. They weapons were visibly pointing at him. "Tell me, S'Artin," Hershied said over the com, "do I need to blow you to atoms now, or will you surrender?"

Tobin sighed tiredly. _Klinti, I'll be seeing you soon_, he thought. "Moff Hershied, you lost the battle, but it appears you have won the war. Well played, Madame. I surrender."


	31. A Student of History

Just a reminder that review responses are posted in my forums. Thank you all for reading!

* * *

**Chapter Thirty-One: A Student of History**

The shuttle rang with the sound of clamps on its hull as the Imperial frigate secured it. Through the cockpit Tobin watched as the outer bay doors closed for transit. Already hundreds of troopers ran into the largest open space on the ship and took positions around the shuttle.

Tobin waited until he saw a woman of average height step into the bay. She wore a finely tailored grey Moff's uniform and walked within a circle of several officers in black. She walked confidently across the bay until she stood just outside the main doors of the shuttle.

Tobin took a deep, meditative breath. Was this fear he felt? The Sith were supposed to never feel fear, and the Jedi were supposed to never allow fear to control their action. And yet it was fear that kept him in his seat.

"Enough," he growled. With a final shake of his head, Tobin stood and walked to the shuttle hatch and hit the switch to open it. The door section swung outward with a hiss and continued to swing down until it formed a ramp.

Moff Dila Hershied stood just inches away from where the ramp came to a rest.

"In case you thought of any last minute attempts at escape," she announced, "the entire bay has been set to explosively decompress in the event you do anything but comply with my commands. Your death is worth my life, and the lives of all those in this room. Now, your weapons."

She stood expectantly.

"There is no fear," Tobin whispered to himself. He unclipped his sabers.

"Place them on the ramp and roll them down," Hershied ordered. "Do not otherwise approach."

Tobin did as instructed and let the two sabers—one from the last Jedi, and one from the last Sith Lord—roll down into the waiting hands of an Imperial moff. She held the two cylinders gingerly, as if they might ignite in her hands.

After a moment, she handed them to a trooper. "Destroy these immediately," she told the trooper. "Record the procedure for verification."

The trooper snapped to attention and saluted before taking proffered sabers and leaving the bay at a fast trot.

When he was gone, she returned her attention to Tobin. "I'm a student of history, Mr. S'Artin. And the history of your kind suggests that failure to destroy your weapons can often times prove lethal." She smiled up at him. "We can do this two ways, Mr. S'Artin. I am not a barbarian. I do not enjoy the application of pain. If you comply with my orders and make no attempt to escape, I shall not cause you to be unduly hurt. If you do not comply or cooperate, then I will apply pain, up to and including your death. The Emperor would like you alive for public execution, but your corpse will still accomplish his ultimate goal."

Tobin ground his teeth together, but nodded brusquely. "I offer my unconditional surrender," he finally said.

Hershied nodded to a pair of troopers who stepped forward with a pair of thick stuncuffs. They pulled Tobin's hands behind his back and secured them. A second pair of troopers attached a pair of ankle stuncuffs as well.

Only when he was finally secured did Hershied step onto the ramp. "I understand now," she said as she stared at him. "Your mother thought she was a Jedi, did she not? You are young. Younger than I expected, honestly. You are just doing what your mother told you to do. It's not your fault that you could not understand the might of the Empire."

Tobin said nothing. He didn't trust himself to speak.

"Process him, and then take him to the special cell," Hershied said. "If he attempts to resist, execute the Abnormal procedures."

With that, Moff Hershied turned and stepped off the ramp while, under the blaster gauntlets of an entire company, four troopers pulled Tobin toward his fate.

~~Last Jedi~~

~~Last Jedi~~

Processing entailed four troopers ripping Tobin's clothes off until he stood nude in the center of a large, painfully lit room. They even removed his signet ring, though he said nothing about it. In the center of the room, he stood and waited while troopers and officers on the other side of an opaque window watched.

Tobin noted many of the officers were female.

Suddenly jets of hot steam and decontaminating agents spread up from the floor and down from the ceiling. Tobin curtailed his cry only by gritting his teeth tightly together. When his decontamination was done, a woman's voice ordered him out of the room.

In the next much smaller chamber Tobin found a white, single-piece jumpsuit and slippers. Again, one entire wall consisted of opaque windows through which officers and troopers watched him.

He pulled the jumpsuit and slippers on.

A voice ordered him through yet another door, and the moment he stepped through Tobin felt a wave of nausea sweep through him, followed by deadening of all his senses. After a moment, he realized he could not touch or even feel the Force at all.

The passageway behind him closed off behind a thick padded wall. The only wall that was not white and padded was the window facing him. There, he found himself staring at Moff Hershied alone.

"Welcome to the only remaining Jedi holding cell in the galaxy," she said. "Once upon a time every ship in the fleet had a room like this. But then the Jedi went extinct, like the Sith. There was no need for ysalamiri nodes. Which is fortunate, since during the extinction of your kind the beast also became extinct. The nodes are extracted from the animals and built into the walls themselves. I had this entire cell cut out of an old decommissioned museum destroyer and put in here. I'm glad it was worth the effort." She smirked. "We will be in Coruscant in four days. Make yourself comfortable."

She turned and walked away.

Tobin sat on the floor in the absence of any other furnishings, crossed his legs, and bowed his head. "There is no fear," he said again.

~~Last Jedi~~

~~Last Jedi~~

Hershied's four ships were soon joined by more, since neither she nor the Emperor wanted to risk S'Artin's forces attempting to free him. By the time they were a day out, a small armada of fifteen frigates flew in tight formation.

Hershied observed all this with a grim smile from her office. Since the capture, she had not emerged into the rest of the ship. Nor had she entertained any company. Captain Lostrin looked faintly hurt when she declined his offer for company on the first night shift after S'Artin's capture.

No, she remained alone in her office, staring intently at the only piece of jewelry removed from her prisoner.

Tobin S'Artin wore an imperial signet ring.

She discretely had the magistrate on board confirm the ring's authenticity, and then told him that it was his death at the hands of the Emperor if he divulged anything about it. She was not naïve—her own knowledge of the ring could spell her death. Yet she could not stop looking at it. She could not stop thinking about it. How could an Abnormal have an Imperial signet ring?

She called up the information on S'Artin. Already the file was updated with images from his capture. The rest was no different than the first time she viewed it over a year before. He was the last scion of the last line of true Jedi. Yet he also carried a red saber, which supposedly as a Sith artifact.

She followed his file all the way back to the complete access block beyond which not even she could go. The name S'Artin carried true through every generation, son to son, until in the end a single daughter was born.

Who was Tobin S'Artin's father?

Why would the last Jedi have an Imperial signet ring?

The answer hovered just on the edge of Hershied's mind, but her heart quailed at the thought. Did she really want to know the answer, when the question itself was dangerous enough to mean her death?

Hershied abruptly stood with the signet in her hand and strode out of her office. Immediately the two troopers assigned to her security fell into step behind her. She said nothing, merely nodding at her subordinates, as she moved through the ship. Most were exuberant since she had formally promised the bounty on Tobin's head to all the crews and officers of the task force.

When she reached the cell, she gave curt orders and both her escorts and the two troopers on duty stepped outside.

The boy—for he looked like he was barely out of his teens—remained right where she last saw him, cross-legged in the middle of his cell. She knew from reports that he was eating and drinking normally, but had not spoken to anyone.

She ignored him for the moment as she typed in a set of commands into the control panel behind her. When she was assured that all recording equipment was deactivated, she stepped back to the window and stared down at the boy.

He was handsome, she admitted to herself. Young and strong, just like those lovely young officers fresh out of the Academy. In another time, another place, she would have enjoyed playing with him. But this was not the time, and Tobin S'Artin was definitely not in the right place.

She knocked on the glass and held up the ring. "What is this?" she demanded.

He stared back at her with a blank expression. "A signet ring," he said.

She took a deep breath. The next question could mean her death, and yet the words came out almost of their own accord. She had to know. "Why were you wearing an Imperial signet ring?"

Tobin stared at her long and hard. "Whatever happened to Heindt Reindel?"

The question struck Hershied like a slap in the face. "Speeder accident. His whole family was killed."

"A shame," Tobin said tonelessly. "Your emperor killed his entire family because he knew the truth. The royal genealogist and his entire family. Do you really want to know?"

That was the crux of the problem, wasn't it? Hershied did want to know, she just didn't want to pay the price for that knowledge. Yet standing there, staring down at this handsome young man she was personally taking to his death, she felt as if she stood on the brink of something terrifying and monumental.

"I would think you would want to tell me. That you would want to do everything in your power to kill me."

He stared at her long and hard. "Do you know how many truly innocent civilians you killed when you attacked the rings? Husbands and wives and children who had never raised a hand against the Empire, but just wanted to live their lives?"

"Too many," Hershied admitted. "I am also to blame for letting the Rings become as populated as it did, and so in your eyes I should be doubly damned. So why not divulge secrets that would lead to my death?"

"You're a good officer."

It was not the answer she was expecting. "Excuse me?"

"You're not necessarily a good person," Tobin continued. "Neither am I, for that matter. But I sensed you were a good officer. Duty and loyalty above all else. A firm sense of justice. You destroyed the Rings because you believed it was your duty to do so, not out of spite or malice. The law is your god, the Emperor your messiah. But when you look at me, your faith waivers. Even without the Force, I can see it in your eyes. You know why I wear that ring."

"You're the Emperor's son," she whispered.

Tobin stared at her, and then inexplicably grinned. "That would simplify things," he said. His chuckle was without humor and sounded despairing. "No, Moff Hershied, I had no father. As has happened once before, I was conceived through parthenogenesis by the power of the Force itself just like my ancestor Anakin Skywalker."

Hershied was a student of history—not the stuff taught to public students—but the true history in the restricted and controlled texts. The history of the First Empire and the events leading to and from it.

Anakin Skywalker, father of Luke Skywalker and Leia Organa Solo. Grandfather of Jaina Solo-Fel, the First Empress. Her breath slowed as her mind whirled across the names—names forgotten by most of the Empire, but well remembered by those in power.

Tobin stared at her intently as he continued to speak. "My full name is Tobin Solo Fel Artin. I am the direct descendent of Princess Sariah Solo Fel, daughter of his Imperial Majesty, Emperor Soonter Solo Fel I, and Jedi Knight Cray Skywalker Cartin. The signet ring was given to Princess Sariah by the Emperor himself. I wear it as her only surviving descendent."

Hershied stared at him, hunting his features for something—anything—that could let her believe it was all a lie. Even as she searched his face, though, she knew it wasn't. The fact that the security blocks on his ancestry came from Corusca itself spoke volumes.

"And now I'm truly going to seal your fate, Moff Hershied," Tobin said. He spoke sadly, as if he truly regretted the conversation. "The Fel royal family was founded by a Jedi Knight in the form of Jaina Solo Fel. The Force runs strong in that family, even on the side that has tried its best to deny it. With the last royal birth, the Skywalker genes asserted themselves at last. The Princess Mariha Jana Fel is Force sensitive. Her midichlorian account is three times the proscribed level. The Emperor knows this, and his made sure that he is the only one who does."

Hershied backed away from him and shook her head. "You couldn't possibly know this."

"The ghost of a dead Sith emperor showed me," Tobin said. "He was quite pleased to see the Force rear itself from the loins of a man vowed to destroy it. For in this, the Sith and Jedi were one. The Force itself will not allow its extinction."

Hershied turned and fled.

~~Last Jedi~~

~~Last Jedi~~

In the ancient days of the Republic, generals returning from conflict were given a triumphant welcome on Coruscant. In those days there were still open surface areas where the general could be paraded through the city toward the waiting members of the Galactic Senate, where the Chancellor would place on their head a wreath of red corusca gems.

"The gems are the color of the blood you shed to preserve us all," the Chancellor would say to the triumphant general, "and for the mortal coil which we all share. Enjoy this moment, for it is fleeting."

When Hershied saw the welcome awaiting her, she could not help but feel the coil of her own mortality constrict around her.

The main skyway leading to the mountainous Imperial Palace was empty. Traffic consisting of millions of aircars and transports had been completely re-routed. Instead, hoverstands and balconies lined the route with hundreds of thousands, possibly even millions of Imperial citizens waiting for the chance to see the Abnormal who thought he could challenge the might of the Empire.

Hershied turned and looked back at Tobin S'Artin. He sat cross-legged in the middle of his cell, taken whole from her destroyer and placed on a hoversled. The front window was clear, and so allowed all in front of them a clear view of the prisoner.

His eyes were closed. He looked ridiculously young.

Beside her, Grand Moff Shol Dinteri smiled and waived at the crowds. "Wave," he ordered under his breath.

One did not reach the vaunted position of Moff without a thorough understanding of the theatrics of politics. Hershied plastered her best smile on her face, and waved at the appreciative crowds.

"You lost more than half your task force and a hypermatter production facility worth two hundred billion credits," Dinteri said around his own wide smile. "And they're giving you a Triumph."

"I don't understand it either, Shol," Hershied said. "If someone under my command had such results, I'd have them placed on report."

"That's Imperial politics for you," Dinteri said.

He took a brief moment and looked her in the eyes. "You have the notice of powerful people, Dila. You will get your Grand Moff title. But with that power comes a terrible price. When lower ranks fail, they are written up. When we fail, we are publically beheaded."

"I understand," Hershied said. She shuddered at the memory of her last summons to the Imperial Palace.

The parade floated majestically through the skies of Coruscant toward the looming mountain that was the Imperial Palace. The closer they came, the denser the crowds became. She waved and smiled, while behind her Tobin S'Artin continued to sit cross-legged in silence. She did notice some strange banners on distant towers

The banners were plain white, but with a circle in black bisected by a half line. She did not recognize the symbols, but suspected they were some new propaganda slogan the Emperor's public education people cooked up.

The greatest surprise was at the Palace itself. A massive platform jutted out from the side of the sheer palace walls, projecting at least a kilometer out. The platform rested on thousands of repulsor coils and held a full legion of troopers standing three rows deep in a line to the head of the platform nearest the palace walls. Behind the three rows of troopers waited thousands of higher-ranked citizens and officials of the Empire.

This was her new realm, Hershied realized. If she was going to survive, she would have to learn to swim in these new waters.

The hoversled came to a stop on the edge of the platform. Tobin did not move, but with a subtle flick of the eyes Dinteri indicated Hershied should. She stepped off the sled onto the platform to the adoring cheers of the crowds, and the cold, fixed visages of the troopers' helmets.

Waiting for her half-way to the dais, resplendent in his white Grand Admiral's uniform, stood Taklon Chinlee, beaming at her. He greeted her with a shake of her hand. "A remarkable welcome for a woman her burned through more than half her taskforce and lost a hyperdrive production facility," he said with a genuinely happy laugh.

"So Shol told me," she quipped. She restrained an urge to hug the man. Such shows of emotion would damn her future as quickly as breaking down would.

Flanked by a grand moff on her left, and a grand admiral on her right, Moff Dila Hershied continued walking through the adoring crowd until she approached the throne of his Most Imperial Majesty, Emperor Antius Huun Fel III.

The Emperor's eyes continually travelled over Hershied's head toward the cell, and its single occupant. She understood. There was a small, irrational part of her mind that envisioned S'Artin breaking out somehow and killing them all. She knew it was irrational—if Jedi were ever that powerful, they would never have been hunted down so effectively. Still, the unease lingered.

When she reached the proscribed distance from the throne, she knelt down on one knee with a bowed head. Words she had rehearsed came easily to her list. "Your Imperial Majesty, in accordance with your will and express orders, I bring before you the Abnormal criminal, Tobin S'Artin."

"Rise, Dila Hershied," the Emperor said. His use of her name alone was intentional.

She rose and looked at the throne. Standing to his left was his daughter, the Princess Mariha Jana Fel.

The Emperor was looking right at Hershied. With a force of will harder than she expected, she kept her eyes squarely on the Emperor's face. She realized that if her gaze lingered for any distance on the Princess—if the Emperor suspected that she had any knowledge at all—she would die this day.

Whatever he saw must have assured him. The Emperor nodded and stood. "Dila Hershied, you may approach the throne."

Hershied slowly walked forward, fully conscious of the Imperial guards that flanked the Imperial family. She had no doubt the whole platform was ray shielded with every other protection conceivable.

Finally, she stood before the leader of the galaxy. "Kneel, Dila," he said in a strong voice that reverberated through the city, carried on millions of holonet nodes through discreetly hidden directional microphones.

Hershied knelt before the Emperor.

"Dila Hershied, for services rendered to the Empire with excellence and zeal; for duty rendered with loyalty and skill; for accomplishments achieved beyond the role of your office alone, I hereby appoint you to the Moff's Council. To the esteemed members of the Moff's Council, I present you your newest member, Grand Moff Dila Hershied."

The crowds roared their approval. Hershied could not hide the flush of her cheeks as the sheer power of the sound poured over her. She stood at stiff attention as the Emperor personally affixed her new insignia.

"Thank you, Your Majesty," she said as she bowed.

His look of Imperial calm cracked a little. "You lost half your fleet and a hypermatter facility," he whispered in a strange echo of both Chinlee and Dinteri. "By all rights I should have you shot."

She said nothing. There were no excuses.

"However, every day needs its hero," he continued. "And your mission was accomplished. For this, you have our thanks. There will be a feast afterward. I will see you there."

"It will be my pleasure, Majesty," she said with a waist-deep bow. As Grand Moff, the niceties changed. She was no longer required to kneel.

He nodded to her, and then returned to his seat as she backed down off the platform until she stood once more with Dinteri and Chinlee.

"I always knew you would go far," Chinlee said when she rejoined him.


	32. Adrift in a Sea of Sharks

Chapter 31 review responses are in the Last Jedi forum. Thanks for reading!

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**Chapter Thirty-Two: Adrift in a Sea of Sharks**

Her Most Sublime Highness, the Imperial Princess Mariha Jana Fel, stared at herself with appraising eyes.

"It is beautiful, Mari," the Most Royal, Most Beauteous Empress Satchana Kuati Fel said.

"I think it makes me look fat, Chana," the princess said.

The Empress smiled gently, as she did everything, in fact. The Emperor's agents selected her not just because of her physical attractiveness and the fertility tests, but also because of her gentle disposition. She herself knew this, and felt it was a suitable arrangement. In return for services to the Empire and producing an heir, she lived in the utmost level of luxury.

Only, a full year in there was no heir. Full batteries of tests confirmed she was fertile. Tests on the Emperor confirmed the same. With additional fertility treatments, the Empress should have been able to conceive a child from the Emperor's shadow alone. Even in-vitro fertilization and cloning failed to produce any results. The legions of doctors were not just confused and frustrated, they were terrified. More than one whispered in the safe confines of their homes, that it seemed as if some greater power was stifling all their best efforts.

Another year, at most, and Satchana would find herself an ex-wife of the Emperor, living in comfort with the others who, like her, also failed to produce any male offspring.

"It accentuates your figure," Chana said in response to the princess. She stood and walked around the beautiful young woman, just four years her junior. She wondered briefly if the next wife would in fact be younger than the princess.

The dress was the same aquamarine color as the princess's eyes, and perfectly set off the burnished copper color of her hair. It clung tightly to her bosom and hips before flaring out around her angles. The Adorack sapphires and Ithorian fire gems that hung in an intricate necklace around her neck served both as the princess's only piece of jewelry, and a brilliant focal point for the dress's moderate cleavage.

"You're servants did well, Mari. You are beautiful."

Mari smiled. "Yours too, Chana. I wish I could wear gold and white like you."

Empress and Princess, with only four years between them, walked toward the exit of the Imperial woman's salon. Armed and well-trained handmaidens fell into formation behind them, and as they left the salon four Imperial guards fell in around the handmaidens.

As they walked, Chana looked over at her step-daughter. The princess's face was set in the faintly pleasant expression forced into her by years of protocol training, but it was obvious from the flare of her nostrils and the flush of her ears that she was nervous. "It will be all right, Mari," she said softly, for the Princess's ears alone.

Mariha nodded with just the hint of a smile of thanks.

The two paused before an elaborate set of plastisteel doors lifted intact from the old palace on Bastion, when the Empire retook Coruscant two hundred years ago. On the other side, the majordomo boomed out, "Introducing Her Most Beneficent, Most Glorious Majesty, Empress Satchana Fel!"

With a last squeeze of Mari's hand, Chana stepped forward. Half the handmaidens and guards fell in smoothly behind her as the doors opened and the Empress stepped into a massive ballroom so large Mari could not even see the details of the frieze on the far wall.

"Introducing her Most Sublime Highness, the Princess Mariha Jana Fel!"

Mari stepped forward with her phalanx of protectors into the ballroom. She nodded gracefully to the wave of polite applause that met her, and immediately waded into the ocean of powerful people.

Eventually, after nodding and smiling and greeting hundreds of courtiers from her father's court, she made her way to the pocket of moffs that congregated together. She knew that the Moff Council would eventually break up and do their own politicking—balls of this magnitude were perfect places to establish new contacts and reassess old relationships.

There among them was the guest of honor for the feast.

Grand Moff Dinteri was the first to see her, off course. Shol was always first to see the Princess. Mari muffled a smile—she liked the older man, and genuinely regretted the court politics that ensured she could never have more than a light, public conversation with him.

He nodded to her as she arrived. "Princess Mariha, it is a great honor to see you today," he said with practiced grace and aplomb. "May I introduce to you my newest colleague, Grand Moff Dila Hershied."

The newest grand moff was a woman in her early fifties with the well-crafted body and face of one who cares about their appearance for the sake of others. She was still attractive in a utilitarian sort of way, but with a strong set to her jaw that spoke of command and confidence. However, the Princess felt a tinge of warning when she met Hershied's eyes.

Or tried to.

The Grand Moff would not meet her gaze for more than a second. For a woman who stared right into the Emperor's eyes during her elevation ceremony, it seemed unusual that she would not meet the eyes of the Emperor's only daughter.

Still, the rest of her mannerisms were perfect. She nodded to the precise angle called for, and said, "It is indeed a great honor, Your Highness."

She said and did everything right, except for the eyes. It was as if she knew something about Mari that unsettled her.

"There you are, Mariha!"

The princess's smile froze for a split second. It never slipped, most especially not in front of the Moff Council, but any warmth it may have contained drained.

The Princess turned and nodded to the newcomer that so casually used her given name. "Duke Dorstry," she said. "It is a pleasure to see you again."

"All yours, I'm sure," Grand Duke Hastal Con-Fel Dorstry said with a leering smile. His eyes were focused on her chest, just south of the necklace.

The Grand Duke was not over tall, having just six centimeters more in height than the princess herself. His hair was thinning on top, but he wore a thick beard on his chin. Though he wore all the regalia of an Imperial cousin and a Grand Duke of the court, his most noticeable attribute was a significant paunch that hung over his belt. For a man of his station to be so fat was itself a statement of him as a man, and his opinion of his station and the court.

Unfortunately, in the absence of a direct male heir and the Inheritance Statutes, he was also firmly in the line of succession for the throne. As such, he was also likely going to be Mariha's husband in the very near future. This was a fact both of them were clearly aware of, as he already took liberties of her person with his eyes at every one of their meetings.

The Grand Duke turned to Hershied. He reeked of Corellian whiskey. "Grand Moff, even after losing half your task Force. That's quite an achievement, Hershied."

Mariha's opinion of the Grand Moff increased with the way she handled the potentially insulting comment. "His Majesty was most merciful and kind," she said. "He forgave the losses I had to suffer and rewarded me for my success. I am as ever his loyal servant."

"Indeed," Dorstry said. He nabbed a glass of champagne from a passing tray. It was a mark of the Emperor's power and wealth that human servants, and not droids, provided refreshment. "And where is your pet freak? I would very much like to see the man who thought he could challenge the might of the Empire."

"S'Artin is being held in a secure cell ten floors down, I believe," Hershied said.

"Well, let's go see him, then!"

The circle of Moff's stared at the Grand Duke in barely concealed dismay, and Mariha had to suppress a wince.

By court etiquette none in direct service to the Emperor were supposed to leave a court function without the Emperor's leave. The Grand Duke undoubtedly knew that. However, as the current heir apparent to the throne and the third most powerful voice in the Empire beneath the Emperor and the combined Moff's council, the Duke was not without his own authority. To insult him or deny a request was itself a disastrous move. Hershied found herself in a no-win situation.

"Perhaps Your Grace would be more interested in a dance?" Mariha asked, though she admitted a passing interest in the prisoner as well.

Dorstry waved the offer down. "Do I look like I care to dance? What I care to do is see this supposed Last Jedi. And I want your company, Mariha, as well as the esteemed court champion who caught him."

Hershied nodded. "As your Grace wishes. If you will follow me, it would be my honor to escort you and Her Imperial Highness to the prisoner's cell."

Mariha found herself studying Hershied, as did Moff Dinteri. The Duke merely nodded expectantly.

The princess caught Herhied's glance back at Shol before she led the Duke and Princess through the milling crowds of the Court. Mariha smiled when she realized what Hershied was doing.

They suddenly came into a clear spot on the floor where the Emperor was talking with several members of the Imperial Law Court. The Emperor spotted his latest Grand Moff, his heir apparent and his daughter, but continued speaking as Hershied merely stood at attention.

Mariha found herself enjoying the show as her cousin the Duke silently fumed.

Finally, the Emperor deigned to notice the guest of honor. "Grand Moff Hershied, I trust you are enjoying the feast?"

"I am, Your Majesty, thank you," Hershied said with her neck bent. "I have been given the honor of escorting His Grace, Grand Duke Dorstry, to view the prisoner. As it is my fervent desire to assist the Duke with his request, I humbly beg your leave to temporarily absent myself from this feast."

"A highly unusual request, to have an Imperial guest of honor serve as a tour guide," the Emperor said. He did not look at Dortry. "It is gracious of you to serve as such, Hershied. You have our leave to assist our royal cousin in his desire."

"I thank you, Majesty," Hershied said with another bow and a military snap of her heels. She then turned to the Grand Duke. "Thank you for your patience, Your Grace. I now have leave to show you the prisoner, if you would care to join me?"

Hershied had done everything right. Mariha watched as Dostry flushed red, but nodded curtly. "Very well, Grand Moff," he said. "Lead the way."

Flanked by both Mariha's protectors and the Duke's own personal guard, they formed quite the merry band as they reached a lift and went down and then perpendicular to the modified storage bay where S'Artin was being held.

The bay itself was fairly small, but brilliantly lit. In the center of it sat the modified cell, wired to its own generator with secondary feeds from the palace power net. Ten troopers stood at stiff attention around the cell, while inside sat Tobin S'Artin.

Dorstry strode past the woman and walked right up to the glass. As Mari and Hershied drifted up behind him, the Grand Duke started to laugh. "This was the threat?" he said. "This skinny little runt challenged the Empire? Hershied, don't you believe the threat was exaggerated even a little?"

Mariha smiled her forced smile at the Duke's tirade and let her eyes drift back to the man sitting in the cell. But what was meant as a glancing gaze suddenly became an intense stare. She found her eyes locked with his while beside her Dorstry continued to rant about what a puny and insignificant bug the supposed Last Jedi was.

His lips moved silently. Yet, staring into his eyes, it was as if he were speaking directly to her. _I know you_.

Suddenly Grand Moff Hershied was there. "Perhaps we should go, Your Highness," she whispered.

With some effort, Mariha tore her eyes away from the prisoner and toward Hershied. For the first time that evening, the Grand Moff met her gaze.

_You are like him_.

It sounded like the Moff's voice, yet she did not speak. Her lips did not move, and the moment lasted only until Hershied shifted her gaze to the ranting Duke. Only a lifetime of court training allowed her to stifle the shudder that ran through her body as her gaze drifted back once more to the man in the cell.

He did not look much older than she did. His dark hair was cut short. Underneath the plain white jumper was obviously a well-toned body. But it was his eyes that spoke of danger. In him, Mariha realized truly was a threat to the Empire. To her.

"Grand Moff Hershied, I thank you," she said deliberately. "I wish to return now. Please accompany me."

"It is my greatest honor, Your Highness."

The Grand Duke's ranting died mid-sentence. He could have tried to coerce them to stay, but to do so would have been in such poor taste he would have paid for it politically later. So, with a last glare at S'Artin he turned and joined them.

Mariha walked with her eyes straight ahead, while her back burned with the intense scrutiny of Tobin S'Artin.

~~Last Jedi~~

~~Last Jedi~~

Late that evening, after retiring to her living quarters, Mariha let her two handmaids divest her evening attire. She dressed in a loose sleeping gown and dismissed all but her most loyal handmaiden.

Like all handmaidens, Slana was the youngest daughter of a noble family who paid for the position their daughter now occupied. She would serve as handmaiden until her twenty-fifth year, and then would retire with a handsome pension and a marriage contract to a suitable spouse. It was not unusual to find off-duty handmaidens flirting with newly appointed moffs or rising stars in the military ranks.

Slana was twenty-three and had been with Mariha for seven years. Away from all the rest, they allowed pretense to drop. "Are you all right, Mari?" the handmaiden asked.

"I'm not sure," the princess replied. "What did you think of S'Artin?"

"Deadly," came the professional assessment. "I've read of his case. Cunning and deadly. The security footage at Bespin showed him cutting down whole regiments single-handedly. It was sheer chance and accident that Hershied caught him at all."

"Slana, what would it take to have a private conversation with Hershied?"

"How private?"

"No one, most especially not my father, could know of it. There could be no trace connecting us."

"The palace has many ears and even more eyes," Slana said. "It would be difficult, but possible. Is this a conversation that could occur over a secured channel?"

Mari shook her head. "I think I need to speak to her in person. As soon as possible, Slana. I can't tell you why, but I think it's important."

The handmaiden nodded. "Then it shall be done."

Of course, this was easier said than done. The daughter of the Galactic Emperor was never truly alone. Even when the only person in her sleeping room, an entire suite of monitoring equipment stayed squarely focused on her. Everything from her blood pressure to her breathing rate was carefully fed into medical droid brains to ensure she remained at optimal health.

When she moved about the palace, her cadre of handmaidens and her father's guard accompanied her every movement. There was no expectation or even hope for privacy for the Imperial family.

However, handmaidens were selected for a very good reason, and of all her handmaidens, Slana was the very best.

Four days after the fete celebrating the elevation of Dila Hershied to Grand Moff, the newest member of the Moff's Council received a very strange, handwritten note on flash paper advising her to come alone in plain clothes using public transportation to a middle-class eating establishment several hundred kilometers away from the palace or the Fleet Annex where Hershied's new on-planet offices were located.

At first, she dismissed the idea, but as the flash paper burned into vapor without heat in her hand, the new Grand Moff found herself pulling off her uniform before her conscious mind even decided to go. The note was in a clearly feminine hand, with large, looping, perfectly transcribed and elegant handwriting that spoke of class and training.

Two hours later, Hershied climbed out of the public hovertram in light-blue slacks and a jacket to ward off the chill. It was early afternoon and the ever-present crowds bustled around the city as she made her way unobtrusively through the packed lines of beings until she reached the restaurant in the note.

The note had said to introduce herself as Lida and ask for table 10.

The server was a person, for the exact opposite reason that humans or other sentients were used as servers in the palace. In the palace, they were used as a mark of extreme wealth. In this place, they were used because the owners could not afford a droid.

Still, the restaurant was clean enough, she supposed. It reminded her of some of the places on Bastion she patronized during her Academy days. Table ten proved to be an enclosed room in the back. She stepped through and stood aside as the maître de closed the door, and found herself staring at a very familiar face.

Her heart thudded loudly. "You should not be here," she said quickly.

"Neither should you," Princess Mariha said. Behind the princess stood a muscled yet still attractive woman in casual slacks and a cream blouse. Her loose coat hid an impressive array of weapons, Hershied had no doubt.

"Would you care to sit, Grand Moff?"

"Truthfully, I should turn and run for my life, and for both our sakes we should pretend this meeting never took place."

As she spoke, though, Hershied knew she would not. For as she sat studying the princess, she saw something in the young woman's sparkling green eyes that looked painfully familiar. It was a desperate need to know the truth, whatever the dire consequence.

"Do you think I present such a danger?" Mariha asked. Her tone was one of genuine curiosity, and a hint of trepidation.

"Volatile ingredients," Hershied said. "You, and whatever it is you seek from me that you could not get on your own."

Mariha sat poised, her body appearing strong and confident despite the flash of fear in her eyes. This was a princess by blood, raised and trained by the best tutors the whole galaxy could furnish. Hershied knew that the princess was fluent in almost twenty languages, was an accomplished student of history like herself, and was a burgeoning politician. She was young, yes, but had she been male she would have made a spectacular emperor. In past generations, she would have been Empress as the oldest child. If the Grand Duke Dorstry did not clean up his act, she might be the catalyst to overturn the century-old rule requiring male heirs.

"Why is it, Dila, that when I looked at Tobin S'Artin I felt recognition?"

The princess's question hung in the air heavily. Hershied squeezed her eyes shut. With that one statement, she no longer had any doubt. Everything S'Artin had told her was true. The proof sat before her.

She opened her eyes again, and the Princess was staring at her expectantly. "I know what S'Artin said," Hershied whispered. "I know that men have died because of that knowledge. Men, women, children."

"Reindel," Mariha said, immediately understanding.

"And his family," Hershied confirmed with a nod. "And in all likelihood there were many others before him."

The princess absorbed this information quietly, her eyes drifting to some point over Hershied's head. Speaking with odd certainty, the Princess said, "S'Artin is not just another abnormal, is he?"

Hershied shook her head.

"I need to know."

"I did too," the Grand Moff said. "That's what I told myself when I spoke to him alone after the capture. Now I'll probably die for hearing what he said."

"Not from my hand," Mariha said. "I must know. Please." The princess was gone. Hershied found herself staring at a young woman in need of answers she could find nowhere else.

Hesitantly, Hershied reached into her jacket pocket. The handmaiden tensed, but Hershied removed only a ring. "This was the only piece of jewelry S'Artin had when I captured him," she said. "Frankly I'm not sure what possessed me to keep it, but you can imagine why I chose not to turn it over."

She placed the ring on the table before the princess. Mariha reached out her right hand for it, and on her middle finger was a nearly identical ring. The hand froze as her eyes scoured the ring.

Behind her, even the handmaiden sucked in a surprised breath.

"What is this?" the princess whispered.

"That is why Reindel was killed," Hershied said. "One of Tobin's earliest acts of piracy was the hijacking and theft of an Ithorian luxury liner. Reindel was aboard with his wife and granddaughter. Tobin took Reindel and a handful of others hostage and let the rest of the crew go. I don't know what was said or why, but a week after Reindel and his family were released and came back to Coruscant, they all died in a hovercar accident."

"He was the Imperial genealogist," Mariha said. "He used to call me Merry-Ha-Ha when I was a little girl." She picked up the ring, and then stared at Hershied. "Tobin is a Fel?"

"So he claimed, and that ring supports his claim. He said he was a direct descendent from the last Fel to openly wield the Force."

The princess dropped the ring as if it burned her fingers. "The Fel family has never been Abnormal!" The response was automatic, as if drilled into her head from an early age.

"Once upon a time, it was not considered Abnormal," Hershied said. "Jaina Solo Fel…"

"Was not Abnormal!" Mariha hissed, still speaking from her programming. "That was just vile propaganda the Jedi used before they were hunted to extinction."

Hershied said nothing and merely stood watching the Princess. The Moff college was not publicly available, and only Moffs and Grand Moffs had access, save the Emperor Himself, and those give special dispensation. The Princess, for all her learning and tutoring, would have had no reason for such a dispensation, most especially if the Emperor had no desire for her to know the true history of her own family. A history, Hershied admitted, that very few outside of the highest levels of the government knew.

It was a mark of the Princess's own native intelligence that her defensiveness faded and she assumed an expectant pose. She had made her declaration, and now sat back waiting for a counter-argument, as if it were a debate class.

"As a Moff," Hershied began carefully, "I have access to the Moff's College library, including texts not available to the public or even the nobility, without special dispensation or orders from his Majesty. For historical accuracy, many texts were retained that are otherwise proscribed by the Emperor.

"Jaina Solo Fel was a Jedi Knight and eventual master," Hershied continued steadily. "She was the daughter of Jedi Master Leia Organa Solo, niece to Jedi Grand Master Luke Skywalker, and the granddaughter of Anakin Skywalker, also known as Darth Vader, Dark Lord of the Sith. And for the first hundred and fifty years of the Fel Dynasty, all her descendents were Force sensitive. That is, until Emperor Soonter Solo Fell II had two children, a son named Ronan Fel, and a daughter named Sariah Solo Fel. Sariah was reputed to be a powerful Imperial Knight—trained by the Gray Jedi that served the Imperial Family. Ronan was not Force sensitive. History claims that Sariah, and her Jedi paramour died in an accident, and it was shortly after that accident that Ronan declared all Force-strong individuals to be a danger to the Empire. But there was always speculation that she somehow survived. The circumstances were suspicious since, as eldest child, she was heir apparent. The laws of succession at that time did not require the son to be heir apparent. Look at the inscription on the ring, Your Highness."

The princess silently traced the engraving on the ring. Without looking up, she said softly, "I understand your fear, now, Moff Hershied. Speaking of these lies would most assuredly mean your death if my Father were to find out."

The words should have filled Hershied with fear. However, the tone told another story. The princess spoke without belief in herself or the threat implied. She did not speak coolly or with collected menace. She spoke absently, as if the words came out because she could think of nothing else to say.

In for a chit, in for a credit. "S'Artin also claims that the Solo blood line has reasserted itself in the Imperial Family. He claims that you are like him. In fact, he claims that any child born to your father will be Force sensitive, if there is another child at all. "

The blood drained from her face. "You lie!" she snarled with narrow eyes.

This time, Hershied heard vehemence and anger. It was, Dila knew, an ingrained, well-honed survival instinct that overrode open-mindedness. Like everyone else in the Empire, the princess was trained to believe that being Abnormal was a detriment to the Empire, and would automatically mean a death sentence. She was right. And yet she was also wrong.

"I know nothing for certain," Hershied said with Forced calm. She realized that the Princess could easily order her death. In fact, the Handmaiden herself could probably kill her. It would be a fight, but she did not come armed, whereas she knew the Handmaiden was armed to the teeth. Additionally, aside from the mild political fallout, there was no real danger of Mariha being punished for the crime. Most especially if she claimed some type of self defense. Her handmaiden might have been thrown to the Moffs as a sacrifice, but it was highly unlikely anything else would come of it.

"You know nothing for certain, and yet you speak as if it is the truth!" The princess said, still incensed.

"It is you, Highness, who said you felt a familiarity with S'Artin. I merely shared with you what he himself told me, and what I know of history." She took a deep breath and glanced briefly at the Handmaiden. "Either way, whether I am lying or not, this conversation could easily mean my death. Just like so many others have died for hearing these words."

She slowly stood, waiting for the violence promised in the handmaiden's eyes. "I am going now, Your Highness. I believe it appropriate for you to keep the ring. It is, after all, a Fel family heirloom. Good day." With a nod of her head, Hershied stepped out of the door and did not look back.

As she walked back up the wide boulevards that separated the upper city from the lower, she felt as if a target site was on her back, and that the blaster bolt that would kill her was just a heartbeat away.


	33. A Detriment to the Empire

**Chapter Thirty-Three: A Detriment to the Empire**

Tobin wished he could sleep.

Being cut-off from the Force left him feeling numb in all the wrong places. Without the sensory input his body had grown accustomed too, his eyes grew painfully sensitive. His ears caught every sound coming from the cell speakers. He could feel every thread of the fabric of his prisoner jumpsuit.

He found it was impossible to sleep, impossible to rest. So he did what he could, meditating and doing his very best to keep a semblance of calm on his face.

He found himself reliving the very first of the many days spent in abject terror—the day the magistrate came to announce his eminent death.

That day was cemented so thoroughly in his mind that he could remember very little of what happened before. It was as if that day ten years ago was the first day of his life. He knew that things happened before that. But most of that time was dominated by images of his mother, of cramped apartments one after the other. Of friends he had to leave behind again and again, until eventually he stopped trying to make friends because he knew he would just have to leave them again in a year or less.

Those years with The Zabrak were the closest thing to normalcy that he could really point to in his life. Those years were the longest he had been in any one place up until that point, and it was the first time he had a real friend, in the form of Klinti.

Thinking about Klinti, however, brought up another whole groundswell of memories, and somehow they all jumbled together in a mash of images both joyous and destructive. He saw the way she looked after their love-making, her lithe body glistening with sweat as she languidly smiled and reached for him, while immediately after he held her in his arms, bleeding and burned after the _Fool's Pride_ was destroyed.

"Is that a tear I see?"

Tobin blinked and looked up in surprise.

A woman stood before the single transparisteel window of the cell. She was tall and athletic, with long red hair falling about her shoulders in delicately curled waves. Her dress glimmered with exquisite shimmersilk and jewels worth more than most people made in their entire lives.

She was beautiful, and familiar, and infinitely deadly.

"What can I do for you, cousin?"

Her eyes narrowed in anger. He watched with interest as she quickly looked around the room. "Are you a fool?" she hissed.

"Evidently. I'm here, after all," he said. "The real question is why you are here, Princess."

"I wanted to get a look at the man who thought he could destroy an Empire."

"I never sought to destroy it, Princess," Tobin said. "The Force compelled me to stop the slaughtering of innocents. They came for me when I was ten, did you know that? A magistrate stood in the front of my class, before all my classmates, and announced that I was an Abnormal, and that I was about to die. A ten year old boy."

"And yet you're here today."

"You do not murder the son of a fully trained Jedi lightly," Tobin said.

"Where is she now?"

"Killed, but not lightly and not easily. Just like everything else I loved, killed and buried for being what they were born to be. Not because of crimes committed, but simply because they were born a certain way. And the worst part is, the law is not applied evenly to all."

Mariha's eyes narrowed again. "I think we're done here."

She turned to leave when Tobin's voice lashed over her ears. "The physician who performed your blood test was killed within hours of getting the results. The minister who oversaw his execution was killed an hour after that. I know their names."

Mariha paused, her head bowed. "Lies. You can't know this."

"When you were ten, you pushed a tutor down without using your hands. The tutor was killed not fifty feet from your door five minutes later."

Her whole body froze now, caught in a memory she did not even realize she had. "How can…"

"The idea that we are abnormal is the true abomination," Tobin said. "The Force is power, pure and simple. The myth that Force-users are responsible for war is false. It was not the Force that caused the wars, just the corrupted people who used it."

"People will always be corrupt," Mariha said. "So why should so few have such power?"

"Look in the mirror and ask yourself that, Cousin."

She spun angrily back to the mirror. "You're going to die."

"Yes," Tobin said. "And when I do, I will join those I love in the Force."

"There is no such thing."

"Release me from this cell, and I will easily convince you otherwise."

"You are nothing to me," she hissed.

She spun and strode imperiously from the room. Tobin watched her go with narrowed eyes. _She's the path you're going to choose._ The memory of Klinti's voice whispered in his ear as if she were there, leaning over next to him.

"I'm sorry," he said to the memory.

~~Last Jedi~~

~~Last Jedi~~

Mariha stared at the terminal as if it were made of acid. It was actually innocuous, being no larger than a mouse droid.

Slana stood near the door, also staring at the device in barely concealed revulsion. "Highness," she said, "Mari, you don't have to do this. He's a traitor and an abnormal. His words mean nothing."

"Maybe," Mariha whispered. "But is it right? If he's right, and millions of children have died while I have been granted special dispensation, then doesn't it weaken the whole empire? To have an abnormal on the throne if father changes the law? You know he despises Dorstry."

"Your highness, I am begging you, please don't do this. Or if you do, at least use one that's not connected to the public network!"

Suddenly the door chimed. "Princess Mariha, the Emperor demands you to attend him," came the firm voice of one of the Imperial guards.

"He knows," Mariha said bitterly.

"Your visit with the prisoner was risky," Slana said.

The chime sounded again, followed by a hard knock.

Slana stepped away from the door in open frustration. "Highness, I cannot fight the Imperial Guard."

"I know," Mariha said sadly.

She shoved her hand into the sole opening in the black device. She felt a barely-perceptible skin-prick, and the device quickly did a full blood scan. She pulled the hand back and stood, hugging her arms across her chest in apprehension. The door fairly shook under the ferocious knocking of her father's guards. Slana looked as if she was going to be sick.

The device pinged. A calm, factual voice announced the impossible as if it were something that happened every day. "Midichlorian count 16,000. Exceeds proscribed limit. Fel, Mariha Jana, scheduled for immediate euthanasia for genetic abnormalities detrimental to the Empire."

The princess stopped breathing. The door suddenly exploded inward with sufficient violence to toss Slana against the far wall, where she slumped. Three crimson guards rushed in with their weapons drawn. The palace majordomo followed a step behind. "Princess Mariha, this display is hardly…what is that…?"

The man stopped as his brain absorbed the scene before him. The princess, pale and shaking, standing and staring down at a genetic scanner with an open expression of horror; and on the scanner itself the red light glared, indicating the recent testing of an abnormal.

"Princess," the majordomo whispered, "what have you done?"

Mariha's eyes were moist, but she raised her chin. "I did what I had to do for the good of the Empire. I'm like S'Artin, Belu. A monster. An Abnormal. And for the good of the Empire, I must be treated as one."

~~Last Jedi~~

~~Last Jedi~~

Emperor Antius Huun Fel III sat on his throne in an otherwise empty room, staring into the floor. Not even his guards were present.

He sat thus for the better part of a day now. His only contact with the outside world came just ten minutes ago, when he signaled his guard. He looked up when the far doors to the throne room opened, and he saw a silhouette stand in the doorway.

The silhouette did not move at first. Finally, though, after a seeming shrug the female shape approached through the shadows of the barely lit throne room until it resolved into the form of his only daughter—the only child of the only wife he actually cared for; the only wife taken from him by disease rather than divorce.

She stopped ten feet from the throne. She was dressed in unadorned green shimmersilk, tall and radiant and as beautiful as her mother. She held her chin high, though even in the weak light of the room he could see she had been crying.

"You knew that device was connected to the public database, didn't you?" he asked in a dead voice.

"It is no different than any other physicians are required to use," she said. "I've read stories of parents reading their children were abnormal before the magistrates even arrived. Parents hover over those sites when their children are tested. I never considered before how insensitive it was. Perhaps if nothing else comes of my death, it will be to at least make the test results private."

His hands slamming against the sides of his throne were enough to stop her speaking. His rushing from his throne in open rage and back-handing her hard enough to send her crashing to the floor was simply overkill.

"You stupid, idiot child!" he roared. "Did I not teach you anything about common sense? Self preservation! You think I didn't know what you were? You are my daughter, the Imperial Princess!"

From her knees, she screamed back, "I'm an Abnormal! A freak. You had them all killed, didn't you? All the people who knew. How many people died so I could live?"

"Not enough," the Emperor growled. "S'Artin dies today."

"So I must die tomorrow."

The Emperor froze, but then bowed his head. "If your mother were alive…" he whispered.

"She would blame you," Mariha snapped back. "I know where this comes from, Father. I know about the Jedi and Force traits in the family. I know I'm a descendent of Darth Vader himself. It was only a matter of time, wasn't it?"

He spun around. "Hershied," he growled. "She told you, didn't she? I knew she had to have spoken to the freak traitor. I knew it!"

"Blame everyone else, right father? Do everything you can to prove it's not my fault. But this isn't something you can pass off. I failed the test, and I did so publicly as every other citizen of the Empire must. You can't ignore this, you can't murder all those who know."

The Emperor rushed to her and with a painful grip on her shoulders lifted her off the floor. "Why are you doing this?" he roared.

She was never truly close to her father. She was not raised with hugs and stories on his lap. He was always a distant, mythical figure. Respected, admired and loved from afar, but not like a true father. Still, she could not help the tears when she saw the obvious pain in his eyes. "I will not live a lie," she whispered. "Whatever else I may be, I will always have my honor."

He dropped her as if his hands burned and turned his back to her. Slowly, he ascended the steps back to his throne before he turned and sat down. He regarded her without expression.

The door at the end of the room swung open with a bang, and two lines of Imperial guards began marching across the room. Slowly, Mariha pulled herself back to her feet. With a final deep, shuddering breath, she raised her chin to await her fate.

"Mariah Jana Fel," the Emperor said in a dead voice, "you have been found to exceed the proscribed level of midichlorians in your blood. For the good of the empire and Pax Galactica, you are hereby sentenced to death, to be carried out two days hence. You are hereby stripped of all rank and privilege. You are no longer a princess of the empire. You are no longer my daughter. You will not see me again."

Something strange happened then. Her face softened, her lips parted and her eyes lost all focus. "I think I will," she said softly.

She said nothing more as the guards took her away. When they were gone, the doors to the throne room closed once again.

In the darkened silence, Emperor Antius Huun Fel III sat on his throne in the empty room, staring into the floor.

~~Last Jedi~~

~~Last Jedi~~

Grand Moff Shol Dinteri lounged in Grand Moff Dila Hershied's office with a cup of caf in his hand. Across from him, the newest addition to the Moff's Council looked as pale as when he first met her, right before her Officer Candidacy exams.

He sipped the coffee and said, "Well?"

She looked up from her terminal, startled from her own thoughts. "The princess."

He nodded, distraught himself. He was himself fifty-eight years old, in his prime as an Imperial Officer with at least another twenty years of service before him. He was young enough and male enough to appreciate all that the Princess offered, and he suspected that if circumstances were different, she might even be interested in knowing him better. However, he was happily married to a good,s trong woman who gave him several children, and she was the only child of the emperor.

For another day or so. "It was a foolish thing to do," he said.

Hershied nodded. Suddenly she got the alert from her staff, and knew time was short. "Shol, I just wanted to thank you for all the support you've given me through the years."

The utter change in tone made him sit up. "What's wrong?" he demanded.

"I met with the Princess a day before she took the midichlorian test."

"What are you…" The doors burst open. Three men in the black uniforms of the Imperial Security Bureau stepped in, flanked by two Imperial Guards.

Dinteri stood. "What is the meaning of this?" he demanded.

The ISB officers ignored him. "Grand Moff Dila Hershied, by order of His Imperial Majesty, you are hereby placed under arrest for conspiracy to commit treason. You will come with us."

Hershied nodded. "Of course."

"Dila…" Dinteri started.

She shook her head. "Shol, don't do anything. There was never any treason against the crown—I'm loyal to the Empire and everything it stands for. But I knew I was playing with fire. There's no reason for you to get burned for my stupidity." She looked at the ISB officers. "Whenever you are ready, gentlemen."

~~Last Jedi~~

~~Last Jedi~~

Tobin looked up when the Imperial Guards came into view. There were twenty of them, armed with wrist-blasters. These were the best of the best—experienced, battle-hardened troopers who had proven themselves time and again. The fastest. The most skilled. The most intelligent. After the ten year tour as Imperial Guards, they were almost guaranteed flag officer positions.

They gathered now around the containment chamber. A magistrate stepped into view between them. "Tobin S'Artin, your sentence is to be carried out immediately. Death is to be by poison gas. You will not leave that chamber alive."

Tobin kept his features schooled, though his heart raced. Somewhere in the back of his mind he always assumed they would remove him from the chamber to kill him. He always assumed that he would have at least a few moments with full contact with the Force to seek his freedom.

The Imperials were too smart for that, he now knew. They realized that even a moment of contact with the Force could be potentially damaging. So that moment would never come, Tobin would die, and the Force would die with him.

At least, he told himself, he managed to save some Force-strong kids. It was a singularly un-Sith like thought. In fact, he could almost hear the holocron of Master Organa-Solo congratulating him. Nonetheless, he took some comfort from knowledge he saved at least three children from their fate.

The magistrate nodded to someone out of view of the window, and he heard clanging as the gas canisters were attached to the air recycler. He took a deep breath and sought desperately for calm. He would not die screaming. He would not die like that!

"I'll see you soon, Klinti," he whispered.

Without touching the Force, Tobin had no idea of what happened next. One moment he was trying to steel his mind and body for death, the next he was thrown from his sitting position by shockingly loud explosion. He picked himself up, stunned and partially deafened, and saw a gaping hole blown out of the side of the chamber. Beyond it was the open space of the bay where he was being held.

The Imperial guards were already firing at him, but the container was made to stop Jedi. It held up to the blasters well. Whatever it was that hit the chamber was much more powerful than even a wrist-blaster.

He scrambled quickly to his feet and dove through the opening. It was like diving into life itself. The Force rushed into him, filling his senses and strengthening his body. He grasped it with everything he had, sinking into it and becoming one with it. He leapt easily onto the top of the unit, ran off the far side and flipped over the line of guards still firing.

Force lightning flashed through their ranks. Men screamed as they died, but Tobin did not let up. He moved faster than even the best-trained eyes could follow. Force-pushes sent men flying across the bay with organ-liquefying impacts. Bodies flew high into the air and then slammed into the floor with sufficient power to crack armor.

In mere moments, the entire squad was dead. In the aftermath of the quick, ugly fight, Tobin became aware of the alarms. He also became aware of a woman standing nearby with a portable laser cannon hanging in a strap from her shoulder. The weapon, a condensed and slightly less powerful version of the standard ship-board weapon, still bulked large enough to make her stagger under its weight.

This must have been his savior. "Who are you?" he demanded.

"You don't need my name," she said. "I saved you for one reason, and one reason only."

Tobin did not even bother to smile as he began stripping one of the Imperial guards of his armor. "And what is that?"

"You have to save Mariha."

He stopped, straightened and stared at the woman. "Save her? What did she do?"

"She took the test. She took it on a public terminal!" The woman raged, her eyes narrowed. "Because of you."

_She's the path you're going to choose. _

There was no choice. But not right now, not like this. Finally free of his prison, he could feel fear, anger and determination thrumming through the whole palace. Everyone was suddenly aware of his freedom. The entire palace was on alert, and huge numbers of troopers and Imperial guards were marshalling on his position.

He quickly finished disrobing the dead guard, and just as quickly began pulling the armor on. "We can't get her out right now," he said. "There are too many obstacles. Right now, we need to get out of the palace and make a plan.

"We're already here!" she hissed. "There is no better time! She's slated for execution tomorrow."

That was news. "What time?"

"The evening, I think."

"Then we have time. Come on!"

Tobin slid the helmet on. A display appeared in front of his eyes. A red-line warning stated that he was not authorized for the use of this helmet. Tobin reached into the coding of the helmet with a Sith technique and in seconds the warning disappeared and he could see a broad field around him. He lifted his arm and a reticule appeared, showing exactly where his blaster bolt would go if he were to fire. The target was actually centered in the blaster itself and fed to his helmet.

Tobin made a wave with his hand, and the large gun flew from her grip into his. It was heavy even for him, which gave a good indication of the woman's physical conditioning. He turned it onto the bare body of the man he disrobed and fired at full power. The body, the floor around him, and five other comrades disappeared into a numbing explosion. More soldiers would be arriving soon.

He spun to the woman. "What's the fastest route out of the palace?"

"You promise to save Mariha?"

"What is your name?"

"Slana."

He dropped the weapon with a loud clank on the floor. "The princess is why I'm here. Come on!"

He and Slana ran out of the bay, right into a whole battalion of troopers. "The prisoner escaped!" Tobin said immediately. He laced his words with a Force-compulsion. "A traitor dressed as a trooper released him. He is heading for the east bay. Send backup there immediately!"

The troopers snapped a salute and obeyed without question. After all, he was an Imperial Guard. It was well known that each uniform was gene-coded to the wearer. It should have been impossible to simply dress up as one. Further, in matters of Imperial security, none-outranked him.

He and Slana continued running down the hall. Around them, personnel scurried about in alarm and surprise. Many were still trying to determine if it was a drill or not. Slana eventually took the lead through dozens and dozens of halls and turbolifts that routed through the massive palace. Eventually, after a fifteen minute tube ride down into the heart of the structure, they came to one of the many loading and cargo bays.

Unfortunately, with the palace on lock down, not only did they encounter a full squad of troopers, but also a clump of Imperial guards. He knew with the security code in his helmet deactivated, the other guards would be able to tell he was not one of them.

They did so with a speed and skill he admired. "That man is an imposter!" one of the Imperial guards said. "Kill him!"

Tobin Force-pushed Slana clear, lifted his brace and fired off six quick shots into the face-plates of the nearest troopers. He was moving even as he fired, and for good reason. Already a dozen blaster bolts seared the air where he stood. The guards were incredible fast, almost preternaturally so with their enhancing armor, but Tobin had the Force. He was faster, and more accurate. He did not use his whole arsenal, not yet. As for as they were concerned, he was not S'Artin, but the imposter who helped him escape. That left open the possibility that the Emperor would have to divide his forces.

Still, he exercised every hand-to-hand combat skill he learned at the hands of a Jedi and a Sith Lord. Even the Imperial guards, the best hand-to-hand combat specialists in the galaxy, fell quickly before his fists and feet. He coupled his blows with well timed shots from his blaster bracers. A punch to a trooper's face ended with a blaster bolt between the man's eyes. A wheel kick was followed-up by a shot to the ribs.

In a matter of seconds, Tobin had the entire force dead or dying.

Nearby, Slana stared at him with wide eyes. "Come on!" he shouted. She ran toward him, and together they grabbed the nearest loading hovervan.

"They've almost certainly declared a no-fly zone! They'll shoot us down the moment we leave the palace."

Tobin nodded. "You're right." He looked over at two other vans. With a wince of concentration, both vans activated and lifted off at the same time as theirs.

"Are you doing that?" Slana asked.

"I'm trying to concentrate," Tobin muttered.

"Sorry."

All three vans sped out of the palace. Into the helmet com, Tobin said, "Security Alert! S'Artin and his accomplice have fled the palace! Repeat, they have fled the palace. Southeast quadrant. They are flying two cargo vans. I am pursuing in a third van, ID follows. Request immediate assistance!"

"Affirmative!" came the automated response.

It was a gamble, Tobin knew. Imperial guards had their own communication channel and ID tags apart from troopers and standard personnel. Only an Imperial guard would be able to tell at a glance that he was not really one of them.

He was betting that the personnel on the other side of this the com was not an Imperial guard, and based on the fact that a whole barrage of turbolaser fire arced in front of him toward the two vans under his control seemed to confirm this.

He fought to keep his control steady while simultaneously piloting two other vans in the Force. It was too much, and he decided to release his control on one. The van swerved up, directly into a turbolaser blast that vaporized it into subatomic particles.

That eased the burden enough that he was able to give more attention to the remaining shuttle. Suddenly a flight of fighters soared by overhead. A wall of laser cannon fire overcame even Tobin's best control, and the second van went up.

"Control, both targets are destroyed," Tobin said. "Request permission to return to palace space."

"Permission granted."

The fighters peeled off. Tobin began a slow arc as if to return, but then suddenly dove into the cityscape. Beside him, Slana gripped the hand rests of her seat until they settled into a thick stream of traffic.

"We have three minutes to get out and find alternate transportation," Tobin said.

She looked at his uniform. "You're going to stand out in that."

"Look behind you."

She looked behind, and then started laughing a tad shrilly. "You are not that good."

"No, I'm not," he said. "This was just pure luck. The Force was with me." Behind them were crates filled with freshly laundered uniforms.


	34. Unified Activism

Beginning this week I am going to try and start back on weekly posts. Please note review responses were posted to the Last Jedi forum. Thank you for reading.

* * *

**Chapter Thirty-Four: Unified Activism**

"Where are we going?" Slana asked for the third time.

"I'll know when I get there," Tobin said again.

The two of them were perilously close to the palace, in one of the hundreds of vast towers that lined the route of Dila Hershied's Triumph. From this building, Tobin had spotted the banner with the Unitarian sigil on it. That alone told him there was a sect stationed somewhere in the tower.

It was residential, and very pricey. The proximity to the palace alone would have been ample evidence, but further evidence could be found in the large, bright, airy corridors lined in living plants and trees; in the open park areas in the center of the tower every five floors that took and augmented sunlight to give the appearance of natural brooks, streams, forests or gardens.

The children he passed, of all species, were well fed and happy as nanny droids or in some cases actual mothers walked them to the park. It looked on the surface to by an idyllic place to live—an ideal very, very few could actually afford. Tobin had never lived in places like this growing up, not even on the rim worlds where the cost of living was the merest fraction of what it cost here.

"Where are you leading us?" the handmaiden hissed, quickly growing impatient.

Tobin allowed the Force to guide him, touching it with his mind as he led her up the turbolifts of the tower to one of the large upper floor suites where only the truly affluent could afford to live. The second suite in, he paused and saw stenciled into the paneling next to the door the Unitarian sigil.

He looked back to Slana a moment before pressing the announcer.

Almost instantly a voice said, "Can I help you?"

"Does this suite have a padawai?" Tobin asked.

"Who asks?"

"One who is Blessed."

The door swung open immediately, and Tobin started laughing.

On the other side of the door, Vilmarn Frark gave Tobin a huge, toothy grin. "Blessed indeed, my friend," he said. "Come in, quickly!"

Tobin and Slana entered the door while the Devaronian closed and secured it behind them. He then led them further through a luxuriously appointed suite with a stunning evening view of the palace, to a barred door. He knocked on it three times, paused, then knocked on it twice more.

The door opened to reveal an unfamiliar, young Zabrak male. He looked from Vilmarn to Tobin before his eyes widened. "Is he…?"

"Yes, Chalcis. Yes. Move so we came come in."

They walked into nothing less than a full Unitarian Temple, complete with pews and an alter at the far end of a surprisingly spacious room. Moreover, the temple was filled with at least a hundred or so people of all races. Almost as one, they stood.

"So running the shipping line wasn't enough?" Tobin asked Vilmarn with a grin.

"Silmari's and Shindo's idea," he said. "It is good, yes?"

"It is very good," Tobin agreed.

The Zabrak, Chalcis, was still staring. "Are you really…?"

"I am, Chalcis." Tobin strode purposely through the awe-struck crowd and took the slightly raised dais until he stood behind it, facing the people. "My friends, I am Tobin Solo Fel Artin. With the help of that brave young woman back there, I have escaped Imperial custody."

With a room-wide sigh of relief, everyone sank into their pews, save for Vilmarn who approached the dais. "My good friend Vilmarn here has out done himself. To have a sect here, now, is a remarkable thing. Your bravery fills me with great joy. The Force brought me here to this world, and your courage and faith in the Force guided me to you. Thank you all."

The murmurs from those listening sounded joyful. In the back, Slana noted with alarm many of the worshippers were actually weeping.

Tobin, though, was not done. "Something amazing happened today, my friends. Many of you already know what it is. A travesty has been unveiled. A lie. Since the day he ordered the testers killed to hide the results, the Emperor has been systematically keeping the truth of his daughter from you all. I met her; I spoke to her. I tell you now that the Princess Mariha Jana Fel is Force-blessed."

A woman in the back cried out with an in-articulate moan. "They have announced her termination tomorrow evening!"

"The Force itself cries against it," Tobin said. "And so shall we. I tell you, my friends, my brothers and sisters in the Force, that the Princess is the future. Through her, the persecution of Force-blessed children and the Unitarians who believe in them will become the abomination, not us! To save ourselves, we must save her!"

Chalcis stood. "Tell us how!"

"Protests," Tobin said. "Stage as many protests as you can. Whether people think they're protesting the emperor's lies, the termination of the princess, or just the latest tax hike, get them in the streets screaming at the top of their lungs."

"And what shall you do, my friend?" Vilmarn asked.

"I'm going to go back in there and save her," he said as he looked at the much shorter horned being.

Vilmarn did an odd little dance. "If only Silmari were here."

"She will be," Tobin said. "Tell Silmari to mobilize the Sestian fleet. Every ship. Corusca maintains only a picket fleet because they haven't faced a true threat in hundreds of years. We are going to need heavy guns to get her off the planet. The Emperor would have no choice but to stop all traffic and do heavy scans."

"Do we dare show our hands so early?" Vilmarn asked.

"My friend, it's not early. The hour grows late. The time is now. The future is here and the pieces have arrived. I've known since I was a teenager that Mariha was Force-blessed. Even Klinti knew this was my future."

The Devaronian's eyes widened before he nodded. "I will let her know. What time?"

"Have her position the fleet five hours out off the main hyperspace lane and await further orders." Tobin turned to the stunned Chalcis. "Brother, tell me now, can you organize a protest?"

"I'm the vice president of the Imperial University Student Government," the man said with a grin. "I can have a hundred thousand students in an hour protesting. There's already a lot of unrest because of tuition increases. This could be just the spark we need!"

"Others will join you," Tobin predicted. "The air is vibrating with anger and unrest over what the people believe is the Emperor's hypocrisy. No matter how his people spin it, the rest of the galaxy knows the truth. That he lied to protect his own child, and it was only through that child's virtue and courage that the truth is revealed."

"The holonet said the Emperor was lied to!" a young human woman said.

Tobin looked back to Slana. "Imperial Handmaiden, you were there. Tell my brothers and sisters what happened."

The young woman paled noticeably as a hundred pairs of eyes lit upon her. Still, she began to see what Tobin was doing. "I am Her Highness's first handmaiden. She began to suspect something after meeting with Grand Moff Hershied and S'Artin. So she locked the two of us in her chambers and took the test herself on a public terminal, so that the results could not be hidden. It came up positive. The palace guards broke the door down just as the results were posted on the holonet."

"Mariha will be Empress," Tobin said with absolute conviction. "And we will help her, won't we?"

"Yes!" came the suddenly thunderous reply.

~~Last Jedi~~

~~Last Jedi~~

Arabel Dinteri was a nineteen year old social engineering major at the Imperial University. She was the youngest of three children. Her father was none other that Grand Moff Dinteri. She was also a devout Unitarian.

"My aunt is five years older than I am," she said as Tobin went through the sect, making sure to speak to every member. "Two years ago, she had a baby. A beautiful baby girl named Alabia. Alabia tested too high for midi-chlorians, and was killed. They made Chandra watch, as if somehow it was her fault. She followed the procedures and did everything she was supposed to do, but they still made her watch her four-month old baby die. The sister in law of a grand moff, and they still treated her like a criminal. I didn't find my faith right then, but it made me start to question. Then one day when father let me into the Moff College to do some research on COMPNOR, I accessed a file and read the true history of the Empire."

Tobin smiled at the attractive young women. "And that's when you realized the Force was not an abomination?"

"Right. I've been a believer since then."

"So you've been inside the Moff's College?"

"They have a huge panoramic display in the restricted section of Jedi and Sith artifacts," Arabel said. "Only Moffs and selected officers are allowed to see it; not even family could get in there. But I overheard dad mention it one time."

Vilmarn was busy at his encrypted holorelay issuing Tobin's orders. Tobin examined the young fanatic before him. "I need to get into the Moff College. Tell me what you can."

~~Last Jedi~~

~~Last Jedi~~

The Imperial War Museum took up five levels of the Moff's College, which itself was a shining tower that rose into the stratosphere a few kilometers from the Imperial Palace.

A female Zeltron with red skin and blue hair, and a male Kel Dor male joined a large gathering of curious tourists.

Even Tobin had to admit the museum was impressive. They had examples of weaponry displayed in the five atriums from every era of Imperial rule, including first generation TIE fighters, a full-sized AT-AT, and suits of space-trooper armor.

There were a few samples of enemy weaponry as well. Republic and later Galactic Alliance weapons were displayed in one atrium, but were singularly unimpressive. Then again, the victors wrote the history, and in this case chose the displays.

"And what good is any of this?" Slana whispered as the droid guide recited very facts and figures.

"We're in the building," Tobin whispered back. He pointed with his eyes at the two guards. They were not troopers, but appeared alert nonetheless. "I need you to slap me and start yelling."

"What? Do you want us to get caught?"

"Yes, do it. Now!"

There was little need for Slana to pretend anger, and the slap resounded with all the realism she could muster. Tobin staggered back. "You nerf-herding bastard! How dare you?" she screamed.

"Sir, madam, if you could please calm yourselves," the droid began.

"Shut up, talk-droid," Tobin roared as he kicked the droid to the ground.

Suddenly the troopers were there. "Sir, you need to come with us."

"But I didn't do anything!" Tobin said through his Kel Dor mask. "This harlot hit me!"

"Harlot? You cheating bastard!" She surged forward, scratching one of the guards as she lunged.

"That's enough!" the injured guard cried. He spun Slana to the floor with an expert motion and had her hands secure behind her back in stun cuffs before she could take a breath. A second later she saw Tobin beside her.

He winked at her, the bastard.

The two guards traded off with a pair of replacements that came when the disturbance was first reported, and started walking out of the public into the more secured interior. A control sergeant reading a holozine at the desk buzzed them past the security checkpoint. "Always the last tour, isn't it?" he said. His eyes lingered on Slana's red skin.

They continued through mostly deserted halls until they reached a small cellblock with one more guard sitting behind the desk. "A Zeltron, huh?" the guard said. "I'm thinking body-cavity search."

The man with the scratch grunted. "Sounds like a good idea."

"Don't you dare," Slana hissed.

"Shut up you…ughhh." The scratched man slumped to the floor. The other guard was already down. The man behind the control board stared in surprise before an invisible power threw him against the back wall so hard his neck snapped.

Slana turned to see Tobin removing his cuffs. "Turn around."

She did. "You didn't have to touch me on the rump to get those off, do you?"

"No, I didn't," he confirmed.

The cuffs fell off. Tobin stepped around to the control panel. "I got the man's security code before I killed him. Let's see what we can see. While I'm doing that, pick a uniform and get dressed. Take the skin dye antidote."

"You're staring at me.'

"Yes. Get dressed."

"Bastard."

"Technically that's true, I suppose," Tobin muttered. He took his eyes off the angry handmaiden and began sorting through information and clearances with all the skills that could be taught by the last Sith Lord.

"What's Dinteri to Hershied?"

"Colleagues."

"Friends?"

"As much as two grand moffs could be."

"Would he visit her if she were imprisoned?"

She blinked as she began buttoning up the uniform of the smallest guard. "You think you're going to be able to claim the throne, but you don't know anything. It would be political suicide for him to visit any person arrested for treason. If he's smart, he's erased any and every tie he had with her. Even if they were lovers, he would distance himself."

"Didn't hurt to ask. Still need to get in there, though."

After they had one of the unconscious guards dressed in Tobin's old clothes, the two "escorted" the man up the hall. Tobin used the Force to keep the man upright, with a hand on his arm. It was difficult forcing the illusion of the man walking, but he was able to do it.

The mid-way checkpoint between the public and semi-secure areas and the secure areas was manned by two sets of two troopers divided by a ray and particle shield.

"Prison transfer," Tobin said as he arrived. "This man has a warrant already. He tried to slip through a tour with a Zeltron woman."

The troopers, who had already received a report of the incident, accepted the story. The fact that Tobin touched their minds ensured that none would look too closely at he or the still red-skinned woman in the guard's uniform.

The shields dropped and Tobin and Slana stepped through their man. "Please redirect the camera and deactivate audio feed," Tobin said softly.

The two troopers on the other side stiffened slightly, but complied. The first two on the original side sat unmoving, still locked in Tobin's mental grip.

"Strip," he commanded.

The two troopers removed their armor. With a nod to Slana, she began pulling the armor on. The self-sizing joints locked to her own size, though once more Tobin had to deactivate the security settings in the helmets. He sat the "Kel-Dor" guard down and pulled on the other set of armor. He then ordered the two troopers to put on now abandoned guard uniforms.

"You are to take the prisoner to the cell block and remain there until relieved of duty," Tobin told them.

The two troopers nodded and walked away.

Tobin turned to the two remaining troopers. "You are to reactivate all security feeds and request replacements for the two who have taken the guard to the cell blocks."

Without responding, one of the troopers called the security station to request relief for two of their comrades. Without any further difficulties, Tobin and Slana started walking down the hall of the secured portion of the Moff's College.

They cleared several twists and turned and two turbolifts to enter a huge atrium, at least twenty levels high, replete with gardens, fountains and artificially enhanced sunlight. Troopers, moffs and specially authorized aides moved about the grounds. Although technically the headquarters of the Grand Moffs, the Moff's College was more of an advanced school for military politics and command as well as the official advisory cabinet to the Emperor. Most of the aides there were in fact students hand-picked by their selective moffs for future advancement.

And across the hall Slana was a display that made her suck in her breath, and Tobin grin. He led her right to the entrance of the diorama. A diorama of Jedi history. Within the transparisteel windows stood life-like mannequins of famous figures from Imperial history and several Jedi-specific craft. Central among them, displayed on a raised podium, stood Jana Solo Fel, the first Empress.

"Is that the Empress Mother?" Slana whispered in awe. She had the helmet's speaker off.

"It is."

"Why is she holding that weapon?"

"Because she was a Jedi Master."

Slana shook her head. "That's a lie."

"Why would the Moff's College lie about that? This room is not open to anyone not specifically hand-selected to attend. Those in this room are loyal to the Empire above all else. The Jedi are a part of the Empire's history, for better or worse."

Just then the attendant droid arrived. "May I help you?"

"I have received an information request from Moff Dinteri to be kept confidential," Tobin said. "He wishes to confirm if the laser sword artifacts are genuine, or mock-ups."

"All items are genuine, of course, complete with original power cells."

"How does one gain permission to examine the artifacts?"

"Permission must be granted by Major Shoter. Do you wish to see her?"

"Yes, please."

The droid politely walked the two of them around the perimeter of the diorama until they came to a small office tucked into the back wall. Major Shoter was a short, stocky woman with gray hair and unsmiling eyes. "Thank you, TC."

The droid bowed and left the room. "I understand you're here on behalf of Grand Moff Dinteri?"

"Yes."

"I'll have to contact him to confirm the request."

Tobin raised a hand. "You don't need to contact him."

Shoter's shoulders slackened. "I don't need to contact him."

"You need to gather all of the lightsabers, including the one wielded by Jaina Solo Fel."

"Of course," she said. She used a DNA secured key-card and stepped through a hidden door into the diorama itself. She returned just minutes later with almost two dozen cylinders.

Tobin took one and activated it. A violet blade emerged with a loud hum. "You mean it's still active after all these centuries?" Slana muttered behind him.

Still under Tobin's mental grip, the historian in Shoter responded automatically. "The power cells are self-charging. Short of physical damage, a lightsaber can last for a thousand years before it needs a new cell."

Tobin began securing the sabers in his utility pouches. "Major," he said, "I'm afraid you are not feeling well. Your stomach is beginning to cramp badly, probably what you ate for lunch. You are going to have to go home."

The major doubled over, suddenly in pain. "I'm not feeling well," she gasped. "Excuse me!"

When they were alone, Slana shook her head. "This is too easy."

"Don't worry, it'll all come crashing down eventually," Tobin said. "I just hope we're inside the palace before then."

"So, what now?"

"Now, we go down into the shadows," Tobin said.


	35. Underworld

Chap 34 Review Responses are available in my forums. Thank you all for reading!

* * *

**Chapter Thirty-Five: Underworld**

They appeared as if from nowhere. Hundreds of thousands, even millions of beings of all species and genders appeared on every thoroughfare in the Imperial quadrant that surrounded the palace. They shouted a hundred different slogans protesting a hundred different things. What was important was that they were all there, and that the eyes of the Empire were on them.

Panicked palace officials summed Imperial troopers to all public entrances, while the quadrant civilian militia was ordered to control the protests. The militia, however, was insignificant next to the numbers of protesters. Their mere presence escalated the protests from angry but peaceful, into in some cases outright riots.

With no choice, the palace officials began to send out squads of troopers, while the palace was placed on lockdown. The Emperor was taken to his quarters and placed under heavy guard.

~~Last Jedi~~

~~Last Jedi~~

"How can you possibly know where we're going?" Slana said for the third time as Tobin stepped out of the turbolift and into yet another stair leading into the gloomy depths of the city. She wore stolen trooper armor, hard wired to allow her to use it.

Tobin for his part simply wore an unremarkable black body suit and utility belt. Hanging from his belt were three lightsabers. They had been moving down steadily since they managed to escape the Moff College relatively unnoticed. Down and down they went, through stairs and old turbolifts, into the perpetual dark that the underdwellers lived in every day.

The beings stared at Slana and Tobin with open expressions of hatred, and looking at the half-starved bodies, she did not blame them. These were the true victims of any huge government—those born into such crushing poverty that there was simply no means any of them could ever hope to escape.

Twice large, unidentifiable aliens assaulted them, and twice Tobin fought them off with barely any effort. The second attack was actually a group of alien hybrids, the kind that only existed on Corusca. Tobin killed all ten in less than a second.

Evidently word began to spread before them to leave them alone. And still they went down, through stairs covered in mold and fungus, through turbolift shafts that did not even function any more. The only light was the one attached to Slana's helmet, and the headpiece Tobin wore, and still they went down.

Finally, the ancient, crumbling stairs they were following came to an abrupt end before a chasm of utter black. She thought she could hear water, but her light could not penetrate far enough into the darkness to actually see. "Now, what?"

Tobin removed a chemical light stick from his belt, snapped it to mix the chemicals, and let it fall. The two followed the dwindling stick as Tobin counted. "One, two, three, four, five, six…"

The stick stopped falling, barely visible now. "Two hundred meters, roughly," he calculated.

"Two hundred meters?" Slana asked.

"You have jump jets built into your armor," Tobin pointed out.

"I don't know how to use them. I'm a handmaid, not a trooper!"

"Fine, stay here. When I get down, I'll call you. Jump and I'll catch you with the Force."

"Catch me? Who's going to catch you? Two hundred meters is lethal!"

Under the lights of her helmet, he winked at her and then disappeared into the darkness. "Tobin!" she screamed. She listened for the distant report of a body hitting the ground, but heard nothing. The chemical light had already begin fading and was not lost in the darkness. "Tobin!"

A streak of blue lit the ground far below. "I made it!" he called up to her. "I want you voice activate your jump jets. They will slow your fall."

"You're insane!" she screamed. "I hate you!"

"Hate me later. Mariha's life depends on you jumping now."

"Mariha, you will never know what I've done for you," she muttered. "Suit, jump jets activate."

She felt a burst of pressure against her back and pushed her into the darkness before she was ready. She could not help the scream as she began falling and flailing through the chasm. Without trained control, she quickly pitched over and actually started shooting down until a soft pressure righted her. Her fall slowed considerably, until finally she felt strong hands gripping the belt of the armor, and soft, spongy soil under her feet.

She let out a gasp, and said, "Stars, I hate you."

"Yes."

"Where are we?"

"We are in the original sewer pipe for the Senate of the Galactic Republic."

"What?"

"The Imperial Palace is built on the remains of an older palace, which in turn was built on the remains of the old Republic Senate building. This pipe will lead us right into the palace."

"How can you possibly know that?"

"A four-centuries dead Sith lord showed me," Tobin said. "Now, stay alert. Who knows what's down here."

They moved at a fast jog over the strangely sponge-like surface, which she tried not to envision. If this was originally a sewer pipe, then there was no telling what she was actually walking on. Though her lights could not penetrate far, she also had the constant feeling that they were being watched.

"There is a lot of life down here," Tobin said, confirming her fears.

"Is it hungry?"

"Some of it. I have a feeling we're going to be attacked here shortly. Stay alert with your blaster braces."

"Any idea what we're facing?"

"After so many thousands of years of evolution, who knows for sure."

They moved along for another few moments before the spongy surface grew at once softer and lumpier. She looked down with her helmet light and saw what looked like large veins throbbing through the ground. "What is that?"

Suddenly the veins ripped up from the ground with a wet, tearing sound. She was conscious of a tentacle around her, while nearby she heard the sound of a _snap-hiss_ from Tobin's lightsaber. She was tossed about and did not dare firing since she couldn't actually see anything.

Suddenly the whole tunnel lit up briefly under a wash of blue lightning from Tobin's hand, and under that light Slana saw a horror. The creature looked like a slime-covered tree that stood twenty meters tall with a gaping, toothy maw in its center. Under the barrage of Force-lightning the creature screamed in pained outrage.

The tentacle holding Slana slackened and she tumbled to the spongy surface. Without hesitate she stood, centered the targeting reticule on the creature, and started firing. She saw Tobins' sabers with her peripheral vision and noticed how they were slicing through the tentacles that reached for her.

Finally, then creature groaned and stopped moving. Before she could relax, the surface under her feet began to undulate. She turned just in time to see Tobin grab her arm and pulled her away. In the light of her helmet, she could see a solid black hoard of beetle-like insects swarm up from the ground to attack the creature.

"Oh stars," she groaned. "I think I'm going to be sick."

"I hope not, that armor's the only reason you're still alive. They eat anything they can, living or dead. I've been warding them off with the Force, but the armor keeps them from smelling you. Come on, let's go."

After another ten minutes of fast walking, Slana began to notice an incline and realized the pipe was heading up. Or at least that's what she thought. Her foot pushed complete through the spongy layer into something wet and disgusting below it.

"What you're footing. We're on a build up of debris," he said.

"Why?"

"We're approaching the end."

"Thank the stars," she said.

The end proved to be a narrow metal opening lined in centuries-old crusted sewage, with stalactites and stalagmites of ancient sewage reaching up from the mounded crust they stood on. "That looks disgusting," she said.

"Yes, it does," Tobin agreed. He walked up to the aperture without hesitation and leaped into it higher than any human should have been able to. A moment later his hand appeared. "Coming?"

Careful with her footing, Slana made her way to the aperture until she stood directly underneath him and reached up a gauntlet. Under her light she could see him supporting him with a foot on either side of the narrow tunnel walls. Somehow he pulled her up and pressed her against the very narrow ledge just inside the tunnel.

"How are we going to get up this?" she demanded.

"The Force," he said.

"What…whaaaaaa!"

She was floating up. No jump jets, no hand lifting her, just a strange feeling of weightlessness.

"Use your helmet to look for outlets you can use as a ledge."

She began looking around and spotted several smaller outets, and finally one large enough for her to squat in. "Found one, to my right."

"Grab hold." Whatever was lifting her pushed her toward the opening and she climbed in and sat. She heard scrambling and just seconds later Tobin was there. She could see beads of sweat on his face as he once again braced himself with outstretched legs on either side of the tunnel. "Ready?" he asked.

"This is how we're going up?"

"Yep."

"Fine. I'm ready."

Once again she floated into the air, and once against she found another opening on the other side of the tube. A minute or so later, Tobin reached her new level. They repeated the process five times before they found a much larger opening. Though she could not be sure, she thought she could detect the hint of light at the end of the tunnel.

Tobin joined her but did not immediately take off. Instead, he sat down on the now dry permacrete surface and took a deep breath. "You alright?"

"Just recuperating," he reassured her. She watched as he visibly stilled, then opened his eyes and jumped to his feet as if he just finished a good night's sleep. "There is light nearby. We're close."

Slana could not help but feel hope building in her chest. Her suit's chronometer told her they had been in the tunnels for almost four hours, and the absolute darkness felt oppressive. But as the light grew closer, she realized it was nothing more than an ancient chemical light whose half-life ensured a thousand years of luminosity.

"We're getting close," Tobin said. His voice held none of the disappointment she felt. "Come on!"

They left the old lamp behind, since the two others they passed were broken. Eventually, though, they came across another intact light, then another and another. The light was sufficient that both she and Tobin turned off their own lights. "How long do you think it's been since anyone has been down here?"

Her question was answered when they passed a broken, rusty cleaning droid. "A while," Tobin said. "But we're right underneath the palace, so it's only a matter of time."

The lighting was now more regular, allowing the two of them to run. They both felt a sense of urgency since the time of the princess's termination was fast approaching. The approach came to a stop two turns later. Slana turned a corner a split second after Tobin and almost hit the Force-user.

"What…is that a shield?"

"Yep," Tobin said. "Bastard never showed me this."

"Who?"

"The first Emperor, Palpatine. He was the Sith spirit who tested me." He looked around the hall. "The shield has a local emitter—see there, on the floor. They didn't bother to shield the walls since they are solid, reinforced permacrete."

"What does that…"

The emitter shot up in the air so fast it cracked against the ceiling. The two stepped past the threshold. As they did so, Slana heard a buzzing in her helmet. With a mental command, a speaker came on. "Shield failure, Section 4567 Sublevel 991. Repair droid and security escort en route."

"Tobin," she said. "Security is coming with a droid."

"Good," he said. "Your armor is too filthy to take into the palace without someone knowing something is wrong. Step back around the corner."

She did as she asked, while he simply stood against the far wall across from the opening. She stared at him as if he were insane for a moment, before blinking and loosing track of her thoughts. She knew she was there to save the princess, and that troopers were coming to check on the shield. She just couldn't remember what to do when they arrived.

The droid was a hybrid spider droid with dozens of manipulators and an onboard storage area. It was limited in intelligence to repair. The two troopers with the droid looked immensely bored.

The illusion of peace was shattered when Tobin appeared from the wall as if from nowhere, placed a hand on each helmet, and both men collapsed. "Come on and help met get their armor off," he said.

Slana ran out and began stripping one of the men. "How did you do that?"

"Just a strong suggestion that I be ignored," he said. He looked up and saw the droid making quick progress. He finished stripping his man and levitated the unconscious trooper on the other side of the shield. He then helped Slana finish stripping the second man before he too was tossed on the other side of the threshold.

"I've rigged the helmet, hurry up and change. Do not throw your armor to the soldiers."

"I sorta figured that part out myself, thank you."

He smirked at her as he pulled the taller set of armor on. She stripped off her own and switched over to the new armor even as the droid replaced the local emitter. As she did so she noticed that her armor was coated in green filth.

The moment the helmet was on, she heard a voice calling for the job status. It was Tobin who answered. "Emitter has been repaired," he said. "No sign of intrusion, returning."

"Acknowledged," came the curt response.

They followed the droid down an interminable tunnel until they reached what looked like a turbolift.

"Do you know what levels the Emperor keeps his prisoners?"

"No," Slana answered.

Tobin tried accessing the information through his helmet, but the owner of the armor was not authorized for the information. The turbolift shot them up at dizzying speed before it came to an abrupt stop.

The two brazenly stepped out into a large utility bay teeming with uniformed officers, servitor droids and palace staff. "This is good," she said.

"You're a trooper, act like it," he said as he led them purposefully through the chaos.

Slana noticed as they made their way through the crowds that many of the staff had panicked expressions on their faces. She wondered just how bad the riots were when a security alert sounded, ordering all troopers to assemble at the security cells. With the orders came the very directions Tobin had been looking for.

"Let's go."

The cells were several levels under the palace. The two arrived expecting to see thousands of troopers. They were surprised when only a few dozen showed up. "The riots," Tobin whispered.

Slana was bitterly disappointed when the prisoner they were going to escort turned out not to be the princess. However, she was surprised to see who it was.

Grand Moff Dila Hershied still wore her uniform, though all decorations had been removed. She looked tired and haggard, but still walked with military precision and a chin raised with pride. She appeared fully prepared for the death sentence that awaited her.

She could not contain her shock when Tobin activated the local helmet speaker and screamed, "Infiltrators!" Without hesitation he raised his bracers and shot four men in a split second.

Slana, catching on quickly, picked up the cry. "Rebel infiltrators are trying to free the moff!" she cried as she shot another man.

The surrounding troopers spun about, searching desperately for some clue as to who the infiltrators were. It provided Tobin the split second he needed. "Protect the moff," he screamed at her before unleashing a storm of Force power that swept dozens of men off their feet. Slana tackled the startled moff to the floor as Tobin lit both blue lightsabers and waded into the troopers. By now the survivors realized that Tobin was the threat and fired at him, but his swords deflected shots back at the troopers while slicing at those nearby. Those too far away found themselves flung against walls with bone-crushing power, or pulled forward to be met by a swipe of glowing blue death.

Slana looked up with a heavy-breathing moff when the last scream died, and saw Tobin standing alone amidst a floor of dead bodies. Slowly, she stood until she said to him, "How is this going to save the princess?"

Tobin ignored her as he took off his helmet and faced the stunned Hershied. "Hello again, Dila," he said. "You've looked better."

"I've been better. What do you think you're doing?"

"Well, I'm here to save the princess, but you presented an interesting opportunity."

Dila pushed herself tiredly to her feet. "What are you talking about?"

"Swear allegiance to me as Emperor," he said with a straight face, "and you'll live."

"You've got to be joking."

"If a ranking Grand Moff, even one sentenced to death, declares for me as Emperor, it will make the rest of the Moff College think. If one or two defects, it will save hundreds of thousands—if not millions—of lives."

"You're insane," Hershied snarled.

"Yes." He removed a hand-sized long-range personal holorelay. "Silmari, this is Tobin. Are you there?"

"Tobin!" came the instant reply. "By the Force it's good to hear your voice. What is happening?"

"I've infiltrated the palace. We are going to save the princess. What assets do you have?"

"Twelve capital ships, including _Sword of Stars_. We're coming ready for action."

"Have the _Sword of Stars_ concentrate on the orbital platforms while the rest of the fleet engages the picket ships. If you get a chance, take a shot or two at the palace too just to keep them honest."

"Acknowledged. We will reach you in five minutes."

Slana shook her head. "Twelve capital ships?"

"I've been a busy boy," he said. "Moff, this is your choice. I will not compel you to come. You can stay here and face your death with dignity, or come and help make a new future with me, and your princess."

"Why her?"

"She is going to be Empress," he said. "We are going to change the Empire."

She shook her head and looked at Slana a moment. "Let me guess, the handmaiden?"

"Yep," Slana said.

Hershied looked back to Tobin. "I honestly believe the galaxy is better off without your kind," she said.

"The problem is the galaxy itself does not agree," Tobin said. "The Force is an intrinsic part of all life, and while life exists, so to must those of us who wield the Force. What has been missing is true balance. It won't be perfect, but it is better than slaughtering children now so you can sleep easier tomorrow. Your choice, Hershied."

Slana watched as the moff visibly struggled with impossible choices. "Fine," she decided at last. "Get me out and I'll publicly declare for you as Emperor."

"Excellent," Tobin said. "Now, let's go find the princess, shall we?"


	36. Saving Princess Mariha

**Chapter Thirty-Six: Saving Princess Mariha**

Admiral Halaeus Atchin sat up quickly in his bed when the alarm clarion went off in his ship. He slammed a hand down on the intercom. "Report!"

"Admiral, a fleet of twelve capital ships has entered orbit and has begun firing on the planet and orbital platforms. One of the ships appears to have a superlaser, sir."

"What?" Atchin gasped. "Assemble the fleet, declare a Stage One emergency sector wide, and get the nearest moff to send reinforcements!"

"Done, sir!"

"I'm on my way."

Atchin threw on his uniform shirt since, as senior duty officer, he slept in his pants during his twenty-five hour duty rotation. He ran through the narrow corridor that separated the flag officer suites from the command deck and emerged onto a vision of the past.

An old Republic _Scythe-_class dreadnaught was bearing down on his ship pelting them in a shower of red and green laser cannons and turbolasers. "What's happening!" he demanded.

"The enemy has two _Scythe-_class ships, two _Pellaeon_-class star destroyers, several corvettes of various eras and three modern Imperial frigates, all carrying unfamiliar colors and call signs. The orbital fleet has assembled but we are getting overpowered."

The admiral's frigate shuddered under the heavy assault. "Do we have Moff Tikilim on yet?"

"Not yet, sir," the captain said.

Further down on the deck, the weapons officer cried out: "Brace for impact!"

Atchin looked up in horror as a set of four heavy concussion missiles streaked toward them. "Shields!"

"Shields are down!" the captain screamed, a moment before the HIMS _Diligence_ shattered before the impact of the missiles.

~~Last Jedi~~

~~Last Jedi~~

The palace alarms began blazing, followed a moment later by the dimming of every light in the palace. "Did we just take a turbolaser hit?" disgraced Grand Moff Dila Hershied said.

"Probably," Tobin answered. "I have a fleet in orbit getting ready to extract the princess."

She, Tobin and Slana were running down a hall in the sublevel of the palace toward the lifts that would take them to the northeast tower—the suites that held prisoners of noble or royal birth.

"How long have you been planning this?" Hershied said between breaths.

"Since before I was born," came Tobin's answer.

The lifts were guarded, of course. Two troopers and three battle droids held station there. Tobin left behind his two companions, moving so fast he became a blur. The droids opened fire before the troopers even knew he was coming, but Tobin deflected their shots back to the startled troopers before he then used the Force to slam the two otherwise shielded droids together until they ceased to function. Then he sliced both in half just to be sure.

"Come on, we're on a count-down now," he called.

The two women joined him at a run. "The lift is secured," Hershied said.

"I have a way with computers," Tobin said. They tumbled in and Tobin put a hand on the control pad. He concentrated as he seemed to fight with the security system. A moment later the lift surged into motion.

"How can you do that?" Hershied asked. "Jedi were not technopaths."

"Some were, actually," Tobin said. "I'm told the Empress Mother's younger brother, Anakin Solo, was a Jedi technopath. He died in the Vong war. The Empress Mother's twin fell to the Dark Side and died a Sith by her own sword. She was known by her enemies as the Sword of the Jedi." He reached to the back of his utility belt, which he wore over his borrowed storm trooper armor. "This is her saber," he said.

"You've…you've been to the Moff College?" Hershied asked in shock.

"Well, you did destroy my lightsaber when you captured me," he pointed out dryly.

The lift slowed and came to a stop. The two women threw themselves to either side as a hail of blaster fire met them the moment the door opened. Tobin responded again so quickly he seemed to blur. When the women dared look again, they saw five more dead troopers plus four more destroyer droids.

"Tell me," she said, "could you have escaped from my custody?"

"Escape? Possibly not," Tobin admitted. "You covered yourself well. But could I have killed you? Easily."

"Why didn't you?"

"The Force told me not to," Tobin said. "I had to come here. I had to see the Princess. She is the future."

"What do you mean?"

He turned and stared at the discredited moff with stunning intensity. "She is MY future."

With that, he turned and resumed the scramble through the halls. Each time they reached shield emitters or embedded defenses, Tobin tore through them with frightening efficiency. It seemed he was all but unstoppable.

They turned the last corner to the entrance of the prisoner suites and encountered a virtual wall of defenses, including heavy armored troopers, ten battle droids and a dozen regular troopers. Almost as soon as they emerged, the heavy armored troopers launched a whole barrage of anti-personnel missiles.

Tobin held up a hand and without exception every missile turned around mid-flight and slammed into the defenders. Tobin attacked a second later as Hershied and Slana watched. "My stars," Hershied said. "No wonder the Empire tried to wipe them out."

Slana could only nod in agreement as a whole company of men died before the twin blue lightsabers of one Sith/Jedi hybrid.

When the battle was over, Tobin stood swaying a little, showing weakness for the first time. As the women approached they saw that his side was blackened from a stray blaster bolt. Still, he did not hesitate to slice through the reinforced doors until they gave away.

Slana tried not to gasp when she saw what was inside.

Every one of the princess's handmaidens stood just on the other side to form a protective guard around the princess. Each had their personal blaster pistols aimed and ready to fire. They paused when Hershied stepped around the unmoving Tobin.

The princess eyed the Grand Moff with a single raised brow. "Aren't you a little old and female to be rescuing princesses?"

Hershied shrugged. "I'm just along for the ride," she said.

She looked over as Tobin removed his helmet. Behind him, Slana also appeared. "I'm sorry, your highness," the prime handmaiden said. "I couldn't just let you die! I couldn't. I freed him."

Mariah's face was oddly blank as she looked at her three rescuers. Finally, she centered on Tobin. In an oddly formal fashion, as if they had never spoken before, she said, "Who are you?"

Tobin said, with equal formality, "My name is Tobin Solo Fel Artin. I am the direct descendent through an unbroken line of the Princess Sariah Solo Fel, eldest child of Emperor Soontir Fel II. By the laws in effect at that time, the eldest child regardless of gender was to assume the throne upon the Emperor's death. Prince Ronan Fel orchestrated the assassination attempt of his sister not only to engineer his own ascension, but to begin the pogrom to wipe out all Force-users in the galaxy."

Mariah took this all in with that same blank face, though her handmaidens looked incredulous.

"Are you the reason I tested with too many midichlorians?"

"I am only a year older than you, Princess," Tobin said. "I have seen visions of your childhood for many years. The physicians who performed your test were killed by your father's majordomo, who was in turn killed on your father's orders. The one instance where in anger you accidently harnessed the force, the soul witness was dead before he even left your personal suite. A tutor, I believe. I did not make you Force strong, Princess. You are blessed with the Force because you are the child of an ancient and honorable line of Jedi, just like I am. You are blessed with the Force because the Force itself wills it, just as it has willed that no more children ever be born to your father. Just as it has willed that I be here now, for you."

"I believe in the Empire and its laws," she said. "I will not commit treason."

"I believe in the Empire as well," Tobin said. "But its laws are an abomination. Innocent children are being slaughtered out of fear. You yourself live in violation of Imperial law. Come with me, and we will change that."

"Mariha, please!" Slana said. "I couldn't survive knowing you stayed. Please!"

Tobin took another step and pulled the ancient lightsaber and lit it. The princess and handmaidens alike stared at the violet blade.

"This belonged to our ancestor, the Empress Mother, Jaina Solo Fel. She was a Jedi Master, veteran of the Vong War, and a granddaughter of Darth Vader, Dark Lord of the Sith. It is a legacy that had been handed down through each princess of the royal family, until Ronan put a stop to the tradition. Now it is yours."

He deactivated the blade and rested it in the palm of his hand. Before Mariha or any of the handmaids could respond, the blade floated through the air until it halted before the startled princess.

"It is your destiny," he said. "Like the Empress Mother, you will be trained in the Force. You will be the new Empress Mother, and the whole galaxy will revere you."

"And you?" she said without taking the blade.

"Me? I will seize what is rightfully mine, dearest cousin. By the laws of the age, my ancestor should have assumed the throne, not yours. I am by law of succession rightful Emperor. But if you join with me, that claim will be irrefutable."

"Join with you?"

Hershied cleared her throat. "A sight better than Dorstry, you have to admit that."

"And you, Hershied?"

"I am a student of history, Highness. Though the death of Sariah is a mystery, we both saw the signet ring. Such things cannot be faked easily. That lightsaber was on display in the Moff's College. Evidently Mr. S'Artin decided to liberate it."

With this hesitant confirmation, Mariah reached out and took the handle, though she did not activate it. With a look back at Tobin, she reached into her shimmersilk dress and removed a ring. "A legacy for a legacy," she said, tossing the ring to him.

Tobin slipped the signet ring back on. "Will you come with me, Mariha?"

"My handmaidens must come as well."

"There's enough armor outside for all of them," Tobin said. "But we must hurry."

Mariha turned to look at her six handmaidens. "I will not order you to come. But I do not wish to see any of you harmed."

"What future is there for us without you?" the youngest of the teenagers said.

Mariah smiled at them with moisture in her eyes before she spun about and followed Tobin and the others out of the room and into the battle-scarred halls.

"Pick a body and put on the armor," Tobin said. "I'll come around to reconfigure the helmets. Hurry, now."

The handmaidens quickly stripped out of their formal robes down to their athletic underclothes. Tobin did not bother to look away—not even when the princess did the same. The women knew he was looking, but none had the time to do anything about it.

As the first got the armor on, Tobin placed a hand on the helmet, overriding the security system. Immediately the joints of the armor shrank it down until it mostly fit the teenage girl. It was still obviously too large, but not so much that she wouldn't be able to move. He did the same as each girl got dressed, until he finished with the princess herself.

"Are you sure you can do this?" she asked.

"I have faith in the Force," he answered. "And my people. Come on."

As they ran, he pulled the larger communicator to his lips. "Silmari, this is Tobin. Status?"

"We have a sector fleet forty minutes out, but until then we are in control of Corusca space. They won't leave the planet this open again anytime soon, I can tell you that."

"No, I daresay they won't. I've got the princess. Use the _Sword of Stars_ to open a hole in the shields and send down an assault shuttle. Far eastern wing."

"I've got your com on my trackers. Brace yourselves, it's going to get messy."

Tobin stopped. "Okay, all of you wait here. I have a superlaser in orbit that's about to take out the palace shields."

"A superlaser?" Mariha sputtered. "Those are illegal for a reason!"

"Yes they are. Now brace yourselves."

Though none of them could see it, the massive beam of energy sliced through the atmosphere of the Imperial capital until it slammed into the palace shields. It was a testament to the shields themselves that they lasted for five whole seconds.

Just as the shield generator exploded, the attack ended. The explosion from the shield generator itself was catastrophic, though. An entire wall of the eastern wing of the palace shattered as the generator overloaded in a massive explosion than rained debris over the city.

If the palace itself were not so heavily armored, the explosion would have done more damage. But even with the shields gone, the outer shell of the palace itself was more heavily armored than a hundred frigates and kept the exterior structurally sound. The interior was another story.

The tower shook violently, throwing all of the inhabitants to the floor. Tobin was the first to his feet. "Well, that was bracing."

His communicator beeped. "This is Tobin."

"Shuttle is en route," came Silmari's purring voice. "We think the best approach will be to lift you off the tower roof. Do you have access?"

"We will," Tobin assured her. He deactivated the com. "Princess, do you know if the tower has roof access?"

"It does, but it's restricted."

"Not for long. Come on!"

Tobin put on his own helmet and led the group of women back into the well appointed but still sinister suite until he saw the access panel. Four swipes of his lightsabers took care of the security and exposed a narrow stairway leading up. He plunged in without hesitation and heard the others following.

The airlock leading to the roof kept the atmosphere of the tower pressured. "Brace yourselves, I'm going to have to depressurize the suite if we all going to get out."

The women behind them braced themselves in the narrow passage as best they could. Tobin gathered the Force about him and opened the first airlock door. The second was just four feet above the first, ensuring only one person could go through at a time.

He pushed with the Force. Metal groaned as it resisted the push. Tobin fought against the strain. The air seemed almost shimmer as he brought the full power of the Force to bear.

The hatch did not just pop open. It blew upward with an explosive rush of air that pushed even the braced women to their feet and caught Tobin full on. He shot through the hatch like a bullet into the open air of the stratosphere of Corusca. He came down on the gleaming, sloped roof of the tower and began to roll toward the end and the endless plummet beyond.

_Jump jets_! The jets in his borrowed armor flipped on, righting him and stopping his fall. He increased power and the jets pushed him back up the incline until he was able to regain his footing. By then, the princess and others had emerged into the small utility platform atop the power and were looking at him wide-eyed.

"Did you almost just die?"

"Well, I almost fell, that much is certain," Tobin said. "Not sure if it would have killed me, but it would have made getting out a pain."

As he regained the platform, he was awarded with a stunning view of a Corusca morning filled with tendrils of smoke beyond that of the explosion in the palace. The cityscape around them was twinkling with small bonfires as millions marched in protest, while their sheer altitude afforded them a view of the planet's curvature. Without the armor, they would have suffocated. Far, far below, troopers fought to maintain control, explaining why security in the palace was so light.

"What's happening?" Mariha asked, breathless.

"Protests," Tobin said. "Today is the start of a new future, Princess. Not everyone down there is protesting for you, but enough are to build on."

A squadron of fighters roared overhead. The group looked up to see the lead fighter erupt in flame as a different group of fighters swarmed in from above. "Twintails," Hershied noted. "Your forces?"

"Yes."

"If I may ask….?"

"You'll see where soon enough."

From the midst of the centuries old but perfectly reconditioned _Twintail_ starfighters came a modern Imperial assault shuttle. The pylons lifted as the shuttle assumed a landing position. The sky around them erupted in a turblaser fight, even as the _Twintails_ went after the firing turrets.

The back of the shuttle opened and a ramp extended toward the utility platform. Inside Tobin could see Haslo and Corra Bard and a line of Sestian soldiers. "Come on!" Corra screamed.

"You've got to be joking," one of the handmaidens said.

"No time for humor," Tobin said. He hoisted the screaming teen with the Force and literally threw her across the meter-wide space between the platform and the ramp. She landed almost in Corra's arms.

Tobin did not wait and tossed another of the frightened handmaids, then another and another until only Mariha, Hershied and Slana remained.

"Which way do you prefer?" he asked the princess.

With an angry snort, she took a short running start and leaped the gap with sure feet, though she did kneel down on the ramp. The shuttle bucked a little, but the Bards were both tethered and ran out to catch her.

"Better be safe," Hershied said. "I'm not as young as I used to be."

She couldn't help the alarmed cry as he Force-lifted her onto the ramp. Finally he turned to Slana. "Are you ready?"

"I still hate you," she said before she sprinted past him, leaped the gap easily and ran up the ramp. Tobin smiled dryly as he easily crossed the space.

"Good to see you two again," he said as he hugged first Corra, then her brother. He then ran past the others to the cockpit.

He was surprised to see Antia Malnick in the pilot's seat. In the co-pilot was a young woman who looked a lot like Mariha's handmaids. He remembered her name as Chiala Antias, a niece of Aleusa from the _Hubris. _

"Moff S'Artin, how kind of you to join us," Malnick smirked. Rather than fly up, she deactivated the repulsor coils and allowed the shuttle to drop sharply just as a barrage of turbolaser fire pelted the prisoner tower. She lowered the pylons and pulled up from the power dive going at near full speed in a classic escape maneuver Tobin could not have performed any better.

"Time until the sector fleet arrives?" Tobin asked.

"Ten minutes. We're cutting it short."

"Patch me through to Silmari."

The commodore of the Sestian Military Academy did so. "Silmari, this is Tobin en route. Do not wait for us. The shuttle has hyperspace capabilities. Break orbit and get out before the sector fleet arrives. We will rendezvous in ten hours at Site Zerek. Acknowledged?"

"Acknowledged. I am ordering all ships to break orbit. See you soon."

Malnick said nothing as Tobin settled in behind her. The young co-pilot looked over her shoulder though. "Um, sir?"

"Yes."

"Did you realize that you had a whole bunch of beautiful ladies following you?"

"You know, now that you mention it, I did notice," Tobin said with a smile. "They're all quite fetching underneath that armor as well."

Malnick snorted as she took the shuttle into a power climb. She burned energy in their haste. Already the star fighters had broken off their attacks and formed up around the shuttle to provide escort.

By the time they emerged from the atmosphere, they could see the damage from the attack. Ten broken hulls floated haphazardly, caught in steadily declining orbits that would eventually cause them to fall to the planet below if they were not salvaged first. The orbital platforms were simply gone, obliterated by the superlaser on the _Sword of Stars_.

They were nearly clear when the sector fleet arrived. Nearly fifty Imperial frigates and corvettes in V-formation arrived just outside the main gravity field of the planet.

"Well, that's our cue," Malnick said.

She pulled down the control lever just as the lead ships of the fleet opened fire on her. The sky beyond the cockpit blurred as redshifting distorted the light, and moments later they were in the relative safety of hyperspace.

Tobin had done it.


	37. Force Blessed Princess

Chapter Thirty-Six review responses are in my forums. Thanks for reading.

* * *

**Chapter Thirty-Seven: Force Blessed Princess**

Mariha woke up with a gasp. Her nightmare had been vivid—her father stood looking at her through the glass wall while her step-mother locked her hands and feet into place in the death chair.

"And to think he loved you so much," the Empress Satchana said with a cluck of her tongue.

She left the room while Duke Dorstry, wearing magisterial robes, stepped into the room. "Princess Mariha Jana Fel, you have been found to carry genetic abnormalities which are detrimental to the well being of the Empire. To ensure the peace, you have been condemned to death."

The door opened, and HE came in. The man the whole Empire wanted dead; the man who threatened the crown itself. Tobin S'Artin stood with his arms crossed over his chest and stared at her for the longest time. "If only you had come with me," he whispered.

She tried to yell that she had gone with him, but no sound emerged. Her voice was stuck in a fear-swollen throat. Her father nodded, but not to her. He was nodding to Dorstry, who with a leering smile, leaned over and pressed the kill switch.

The last thing she felt in the dream were the hyposprays against her neck.

When she sat up after waking from the dream, she found Slana sleeping on a mattress on the floor by her bed. The handmaiden sat up at once and was by the princess's side almost immediately. "Are you all right?"

"Just a nightmare."

The other handmaidens entered the luxurious suite, one of a handful that had been retained on the converted luxury liner the rebel ship called the _Sword of Stars_. Slana smiled at them to let them know the princess was all right, and one by one they went back to their adjoining room.

Mariha for her part slid back against the headrest of the four-poster bed.

"Do you wish to speak of it, Mariha?"

The princess took a long, shaky breath. "Just my mind making me question what I've done. For myself, it would not be so bad. But because of me, you and the girls are now outlaws. Outcasts. I've ruined all of your lives by taking that blasted test."

"You gave us the choice to follow. We chose."

Mariha looked long at her closest friend and confidant. "Do you think I've done the right thing, Slana?"

"As Hershied said, he's a damned sight better than Dorstry, if you don't mind me being honest."

"You're not saying anything we both haven't said in the past about the Grand Duke. The man is not fit to rule. But we've thrown our lot in with a criminal, a…"

"You believe him."

It was not a question, but rather the statement of someone who knew the princess as well as she knew herself. Slowly, Mariha nodded. "I do. Father would not have been as worried about him as he was if there wasn't truth in his claim, and you saw the signet ring yourself. It was legitimate. He really is a royal cousin."

The door chimed. The handmaidens once against emerged with their hands on their weapons. Slana walked to the door and thumbed the lock. It opened to reveal S'Artin himself, now dressed in a ceremonial black uniform with dressings similar to those of a Grand Moff.

"Good morning, Slana," he said with a nod. "I was going to invite the princess and all her retinue to join me for breakfast, if she wished it. We should be arriving at our destination this afternoon."

Though he could clearly see the princess, he stuck to protocol and instead focused solely on Slana. The prime handmaiden turned to look at her mistress, who nodded. "The princess would be delighted…I'm unsure of your honorific."

"For the moment, you may refer to me as Grand Moff. I'll admit it's self-bestowed, but I've decided to follow Imperial hierarchy for my organization for now."

"Very well, Grand Moff. Is one hour sufficient time?"

"We will be ready. I'll have a staff member escort you to the dining room. Good day."

When he was gone, some of the handmaids, at least the younger ones, giggled. Slana scowled at them before walking back to Mariha. "At least he's following the protocol. All things considered, that could have gone much different."

"You're right. Well, we only have an hour, and frankly I'm not sure if we have any clothes at all. We'll have to see what we can do."

Tobin, however, surprised them by having a seamstress droid attend them, and by the time the Princess and her retinue finished their morning toiletries, new dresses made of the finest shimmersilks and satins were waiting for them.

A young girl wearing an Imperial ensign's uniform with a blue stripe down her pants legging led them through the massive craft, until they arrived at what most likely was a formal captain's dining room in the ship's previous life. Tobin stood at the far end of the table and welcomed them with a calm smile and intense scrutiny. He was the only one in the room aside from several servitor droids.

Mariha took her position at the other end of the table while the handmaidens assumed their standing positions in a semi-circle around them.

Tobin looked at the princess in silence, then at her servants. "I've been taking protocol lessons from a droid," he admitted, "but as you might imagine I've not had time to learn everything. So when I ask for your companions to sit and join us, please blame it on my ignorance of proper custom. I don't like to eat while others stand."

"If you have claim for the throne, you must learn," Mariha said.

"That, my dear princess, is entirely dependent upon what kind of Emperor I wish to be. For now, if you please, I would like your companions to join us for breakfast. If nothing else, their courage should accord them that much."

Mariha would not help but smile at his skilled derailment of potential arguments. "Yes, their courage is definitely something we agree on. Very well, Slana, Dalaia, all of you, please join us."

Looking nervous but also pleased, the handmaidens very carefully assumed places at the table, though they were careful to stay at the Princess's side. Moments later droids emerged carrying trays of delicate pastries, eggs and nausages. Goblets of citric juice were provided, as well as several steaming carafes of caf.

"I wasn't sure what you would like, so I had them bring a little of everything," Tobin said with a smile.

"Thank you, it all looks delicious."

"The weapons expert I kidnapped convinced me to keep the ship's kitchens intact."

"Kidnapped?"

"Yes. I took this ship because it was carrying three people—Hendt Reindel, Sana Fieliel and Askad Dekarta. Sana has come to accept employment and is doing quite well. Askad…well, let's just say that for all his linguistic skills and weapons expertise, he is still thoroughly Gungan. However, I did find a pair of Gungan females willing for a small price to keep him entertained. They've grown quite fond of him from what I understand."

"You kidnapped the Empire's foremost weapons development expert? Not to mention kidnapping Uncle Hendt…. For the signet ring." Mariha closed her eyes. "He died because of you, didn't he?"

"He died because he knew a truth your father did not want known. For that, I am sorry. He seemed a good man, which is why I let him go unharmed. But I knew based on the visions of your father's actions to protect you that I had placed the man's life in danger."

"Visions?" Slana asked. "You've said that before. How did you…"

"Through the Force, many things are possible." He raised a hand and Slana's plate floated gently into the air. "This is how most people viewed the Force. As a means of moving objects with our minds." The plate floated down. "But the Force is much more than that. It can empower and heal our bodies. It can give us speed beyond that of normal people. More importantly, it can let us view things beyond our mere perception."

"And in this perception, you saw me?" Mariha said.

"Princess, I've been dreaming of you my whole life, though I never knew it was you. But a few years ago, as I was completing my training, I was tested by the Sith."

"The Sith?" Mariha asked. "I thought you were supposedly a Jedi."

"My mother was Jedi—the last Jedi. She trained me in her arts. Her lover was Sith—also the last of his kind. He trained me in his. I've learned both, and the Sith training was…harsh. Before I was allowed to learn more, the Sith spirit of Emperor Palpatine took me on a vision. He took me under the city, into the palace proper, and showed me you. He showed me how your father slaughtered those who conducted your midi-chlorian test. I saw your tutoring session when you Force-pushed your tutor. The man died just feet beyond your door. I saw that you were a remarkable young woman with the potential to be a great Empress, and a powerful leader in the Force."

"What else did you see?" Mariha said. She spoke softly, caught in the spell of his vision, for she remembered the tutor vividly.

"I saw you standing atop a mountain of slaughtered children, asking for help."

The princess blinked. "What does…"

"It was when I realized you would discover what you were for yourself. When I was captured, I was afraid. Not for myself, but for the possibility that I would fail. But I knew when you came to me that the Force meant for me to be captured. I was meant to be there. To save you."

"I took the test because of you!"

"That was part of the saving."

"And if you failed?"

"Then I would die, and another would be born of the Force like I was. Somehow, they would learn. Even if the ghosts of the Jedi and Sith were their only teachers, they would learn. The Force will not be denied."

The handmaidens were looking…spooked, if there was a word for it. Mariah, though, was staring at him intently. "So what is it you see of us?"

"We will wed. I will declare myself Emperor and you Empress. And make no mistake—you will be a true ruler. If I have succeeded at anything so far, it is because I know enough to let those more able than myself do their jobs. And in that regard, you are by far my superior. I was raised a warrior—I will be busy training a new generation of Force-users their place in the galaxy. It is quite likely that the day-to-day business of the Empire will fall to you. But then again, that's how it should be, isn't it? The Empire is only patriarchal now because of an attempt to invalidate my ancestral line."

"And if I don't agree to be your wife?"

"Madame, with all due respect, you agreed when you came with me."

"And damn any further choice in the matter? Would you kill me if I refused?"

The question seemed to truly confuse him, and for the first time she was pleased to note his composure cracked a little. "No," he finally said. "No, I'll not kill you. I'll never hurt you. There just…" His eyes lost focus and his voice dropped. "Klinti showed me. The other path is filled with so much blood. The whole galaxy would burn. Trillions would die. I…you're the only way. Even she saw that."

"She?" Mariha said archly. "A concubine for the future Emperor?"

The sudden flash of rage and pain made not just Mariha, but all the handmaidens rear back in alarm, though the expression lasted only for a moment. Tobin took a deep breath, but did not bother attempting to smile. "Not a concubine. A teacher. Someone I cared for, whom I lost. She saw the future more clearly even than I do. She saw you, and knew I would choose you over the other path. If she were alive today, then yes, she would be my concubine. But she is not, and no other will ever replace her, so have no worries."

He made a show of wiping his mouth. "Thank you for joining me, princess. I understand we should be reaching our destination in four hours. There is an observation room on deck forty-three if you wish to see what you've mixed yourself up in. Until then, I ask that you and your ladies remain in your quarters. Good day." He stood and walked quickly out of the room.

In Coruscan terms, the meal had been a success. Mariha had successfully cracked the composure of a potential enemy and learned far more about him than he most likely had intended her to know. And yet, for all that politically she was victorious, the princess felt somehow as if she had lost something.

~~Last Jedi~~

~~Last Jedi~~

Mariha and Slana made their way to the observation lounge while the rest of the handmaidens enjoyed some private time. The princess almost had to beg them to take a break, explaining that they were essentially at the mercy of S'Artin no matter what.

Finally, it took an order from Slana, but at last the other girls took the richly deserved break, especially when they discovered a holonet suite nearby with a whole library of distractions. So it was the princess and her closest companion made their way unescorted through the converted ship.

They could see clearly the difference between the last vestiges of the luxury cruiser and the converted war ship as soon as they left their deck. The next deck up was stripped down and repainted with gray sound-dampening polymers designed to help soften the concussive force of explosions should the hull be breached; and to provide some minimal shielding in the event of inter-ship combat.

The crew observed the two women closely; Mariha was curious as to why so many seemed to be of Baroli descent, with blue or green hair and the distinctive facial tattoos that marked their culture. However, she also saw many other beings of various races, including a healthy number of Wookiees lumbering through the halls.

She was surprised when one group of younger Baroli actually stopped when she and Slana emerged from a lift onto the proper deck to find the lounge and bowed. "Good day, Force Blessed," one of them said with a deep bow.

Ever the princess, Mariha hid her discomfort with her best smile and nodded. "Good day, my friends."

That caused the Baroli to twitter a little before they all went on about their duty. The two ladies were almost to their destination when they were intercepted by a balding man in an imperial captain's uniform, this time with red stripes on his pants.

"Your Highness," he said with a clumsy bow. "Grand Moff S'Artin wished me to express his regrets. An issue required him to go on ahead of us."

"Is it something we need to be concerned about?" she asked.

"Not at all," the captain said. "In fact it is very good news. I'm sure he'll tell you later. In the meantime, I would recommend you continue to the lounge. I'll have refreshments available there for you."

"Thank you, Captain…"

"Bard, Your Highness. Shindo Bard."

"Thank you, Captain Bard."

He nodded pleasantly and started to go, but stopped at the Princess's urging. "Captain, before you go, can I ask what the term 'Force Blessed' means? I've not heard it before."

His cheeks pinked a little. "I apologize if any of the crew have made you uncomfortable, Princess. But… Tobin told us all almost a year ago that you were Force Blessed. He told us that you would be joining us. None of us believed him, save Admiral Silmari. Even those of us who had faith doubted him. But here you are—every thing he said came to pass. You are… your pardon, Highness. In a way, you are living confirmation of our faith. But that said, if any of the crew bother you, please let me know."

With that, he left them.

"I'm not sure how I'm supposed to take that," Mariha finally said.

Slana shrugged. "Just proves my theory that everyone in the galaxy is insane."

They finally made it to the lounge to find a boy of seven or eight years of age devouring the refreshments tray. The boy had short-cropped, dirty blond hair and warm brown eyes. Those eyes widened when he saw the princess and handmaiden.

"Wow!" he said between a mouthful of food. "Oo rrr oootiful!"

"What?" Slana asked.

The boy struggled to swallow, then grabbed a fizzy drink to wash it down. "Sorry. Master says I need to have better manners. He was right, you are beautiful!"

The term master threw Mariha off for a moment, until she noticed what he was wearing. A plain white shirt held together by ties on each far corner, tan-colored slacks, and a white belt from which hung a lightsaber.

"Are you a Jedi, little one?" Mariha asked.

"Jedi? No, I'm Tobin's apprentice. My name is Aaris! I'm eight now. Captain Bard and his wife are my foster parents, but I spend as much time as I can with Tobin. Although I guess I'm gonna have to share now that Dantila and Delton are here."

"And who are they?"

"Couple of kids Tobin saved on Bespin before he got caught. Fact, he got caught saving them. The real mission was to take the hypermatter production platform, but Papa Shindo says that Tobin cared more about the kids. So now they'll be three apprentices." Suddenly the boy's eyes widened and he hopped in place. "Say, are you going to be an apprentice too? You got the Force, I can feel in on you."

"I…I'm not sure. It's complicated."

"Yeah, that's what Tobin said last night. I asked him why he just couldn't love you like he did Klinti, but that was stupid of me and made him sad. Shouldn'a mentioned her. Take my advice—don't talk about Klinti. Papa Shindo said that Tobin killed the whole crew of the ship that killed her, took the whole thing by himself."

The talkative boy continued to sip his fizzy drink even as he told her the tragic end to Tobin's first love. Though the boy's words were light, the story he told was anything but. "So he loved Klinti?" Mariha finally asked.

"Oh yeah. I didn't meet him until after she died. I tried to steal his credit chits, but he caught me. I thought I could sneak up on him while he was crying, you know? But you can't sneak up on Tobin, no matter how bad off he is. But he's got you now, right? You guys have to get married so the Empire won't keep trying to kill me, Sandal and Danton, and kids like us, right?"

That last statement rocked Mariha out of her pensive mood. She realized then that under law, this friendly, talkative boy would have been sentenced to death at birth. "So does he know you're here?" Mariha asked.

The boy's eyes widened. "Stars no, he'd kill me if he knew I was telling you all this stuff. I'm young but not stupid. If he asks I'll tell him the Force made me come."

"Is that true?"

"No, I smelled the hashi cakes. I REALLY like hashi cakes. I just followed the droid from the galley. But really, if you're going to marry him, you should know about Klinti. Just don't talk about her, but he'll never tell you, so this way you won't have to ask and hurt him."

"Too late," Slana muttered.

The boy shrugged. "All I can do is try." The ship shuddered faintly as they dropped out of hyperspace. "Hey, come on! I bet they have the newest ships done!"

Glad for the odd conversation to be over, the two women joined Aaris by the floor-to-ceiling transparisteel window. The world they emerged over was green with vegetation and massive oceans. It looked new and unspoiled. "What world is that?" Slana asked.

"Dubrillion," Aaris said.

"That can't be," Mariha said. "Dubrillion is classified as a dead and hazardous world."

"Oh, it was. Tobin made friends with the Sekotan Vong and they fixed it really fast. They're growing a new forest for the Wookiees. Wookiees really like trees. Did you know they have these really wizard claws? They don't fight with them 'cause they think that'd be bad, but they're really neat when you see them climb."

As the ship approached orbit, she and Slana caught their first sight of the ship yards, and the ships hanging in loose formation over the planet. The princess's breath caught in her throat. "How many capital ships does Tobin have?"

"Right now? Probably twenty or so, but he's going to get more. We just found out the Grand Moff in the Ulicia sector has tried to blockade the planet so no one finds out he's trying to kill them all. Tobin's gone to save them, and when he comes back, we'll have a whole planet full of Baroli to help the cause. The whole galaxy will know Tobin's a savior."

"And me?" Mariha could help but ask.

"You're going to be the Empress," the boy said with wide-eyed innocence.


	38. Do, or Do Not

A reminder that review responses for the previous chapters are posted in my Last Jedi forums here on ff dot net. Thank you all for reading!

* * *

**Chapter Thirty-Eight: Do, or Do Not  
**

The Empire somehow found out about the two colony ships from Ulicia surviving. Tobin wasn't sure how, but the fact the Empire knew mean nothing good for Ulicia.

He never planned on trying to rescue them so soon after his own rescue, but the moment the communication came in from his barrister on Corusca, he knew he had to take action. He already had too many Ulician Baroli to ignore the rest.

The problem was resources.

He pulled the majority of his rescue fleet almost immediately after his troubling meal with the Princess, leaving Silmari with Bard on the _Sword of Stars_ to take Mariha to Dubrillion. He set up his flag in the newly reconditioned _Hubris _a few hundred lightyears out. He was surprised to find how many of the original residents of the old star destroyer stayed aboard the ship, though the civilian atmosphere that originally dominated the old pirate ship was now replaced by the more organized chaos of a military ship.

The ten other ships in his fleet were a mix of modern frigates and corvettes, and a sprinkling of ancient _Scyth_ and _Pellaeon_-class behemoths, with one truly ancient Mon Calamari heavy cruiser with a rebuilt hull, hyperdrive and weapons suite.

Against these eleven ships was a blockade of almost forty modern Imperial frigates and corvettes, plus an additional twenty missile ships.

The problem was the fact that the blockade ships were already beginning to fire on the surface of Ulicia. It would take only an hour to glass the entire planetary surface, killing every being on the world. In the Force Tobin could feel lives ending in agony.

He, Silmari, and holographic images of Kenth Shandor and Sor'ai Soonta gathered in the command deck of the _Hubris _a few lightyears out of the system as their spy probe sent back telemetry. "Six to one odds," Shandor noted.

"We don't have time to even the odds," Tobin said. "Shindo will be sending reinforcements as soon as he reaches Dubrillion, and the large transports, but we have to stop that shooting now. We don't have time for finesse." He winced as a large number of civilians died in a blaze of fire. "They're dying so fast…"

The others looked at his face then back to the telemetry. "We split up into five pairs of ships," Shandor said. "We come in at an oblique angle to the plane of the ecliptic at full burn and hit our target with everything we can, then blow through and enter a short burst of hyperspace. We regroup and do the same thing from the other direction. We may not be able to hit them all, but we might be able to delay their tactics and buy time."

"It could work," Sor'ai said. "But we're going to have to stay at full burn."

Tobin nodded. "Do it. The _Hubris_ will pair with two corvettes. I want a corvette with a destroyer."

With that, the small fleet took an indirect angle in a one-minute second burst of hyperspace to position themselves properly over the orbital plane of the system. The capital ships used positioning thrusters to pair off, save for the _Hubris_ which paired itself with two of the much smaller corvettes.

On their secured channel, Tobin started the count-down. "Five, four, three, two, one…attack!"

The eleven ships launched into a one minute burst of hyperspace and emerged just inside the planetary gravity well of Ulicia. In front of them they saw the dorsal sides of the Imperial blockade ships, firing constantly on the planet below.

Tobin stood from his seat and watched as, behind him, Silmari started barking commands. The Imperial ships reacted quickly, but the element of surprise was too much to overcome. The Sestian navy unleashed a hellish barrage of concussion missiles, nuclear missiles and turbolaser fire. They targeted the five frigates on the planet-side of the blockade that were doing most of the damage to the surface.

Well-crafted shields flared into the visible range against the first volley of turbolaser fire, then stained under the impact of the slower nuclear missiles, before collapsing under a second barrage of turbolaser fire and concussion missiles.

Tobin turned his attention to the other teams and saw that, at least with this first run, they were all having similar levels of success. Soon turbolaser fire was slamming into unshielded hulls as they flew directly toward their targets.

"Proton torpedoes, away!" Silmari growled.

The _Hubris_ and her two escorts unleased a flurry of glowing torpedoes and ripped through the already pock-marked hull of the doomed ship under their sights, splitting it almost down its dorsal line. The turbolasers slammed into the exposed hypermatter reactor, and the ship disappeared in a plume of white plasma.

Four other plumes marked the line.

"Taking heavy fire, blow through!" Silmari commanded off the Sestian ships. With that, they cleared the planetary gravity well and shot back into hyperspace for a minute.

Tobin took a deep breath. "Any damage?"

"This is Ashotal on the _Anastoli_," a holographic image of the Gotal captain noted on their relay. "Some shield damage and one secondary positioning thruster is out. No injuries. Ready to continue."

"All other ships report minimal damage," Simlari noted.

"All right, assume formations and get ready to hit them again."

Tobin took a deep breath, gave the count down, and said, "Attack!"

The Imperial ships responded much, much faster this time. Tobin saw immediately that the frigates had paired off with their smaller corvette counterparts in much the same way Tobin's forces had.

On the other hand, the blockade was no longer firing on the planetary surface.

Already answering fire was chipping away at the Sestian shields, even as the Sestian ships unleashed their own barrage. Tobin spotted a plume of an Imperial ship blowing up, just as Ashotal's broken holoimage appeared. "Shields have failed, we're taking heavy…."

The next plume was not Imperial. "We've lost the _Anastoli!_" Silmari reported, though it was not necessary since Ashotal was one of the _Hubris's_ escorts.

"Continue through!" Tobin said through gritted teeth. They took two more Imperial ships out before breaking through the line and reassembling on the edge of the system. "Damage report?" Tobin asked.

"_Anastoli_ is gone. All other ships reporting damage," Silmari said somberly. "_Gambit _and _Destiny_ report fifty percent shield failure and have hull damage. _Prophet_ has lost its forward missile tubes but retains aft and dorsal launchers and all heavy turbolaser turrets. The rest are still ready but with lower shield capacity."

"Kenth, we need to pick a new angle," Tobin said.

"That won't be enough," came the holographic image of Shandor from the _Scythe_-class _Sariah's Song_. "The Moff in charge knows his business. We can continue to harass them, but any more runs like that and we're going to lose more ships. We're too heavily outnumbered. And worse yet, if we have more ships coming, they do too. I'm not sure we can win this one."

Tobin looked up at the chrono—they started fighting only an hour ago. As far as he knew, the _Sword of Stars_ would just then be reaching Dubrillion. There was simply no way reinforcements would arrive before more Imperial fleet elements.

"Put me on the holonet, full broadcast, all channels, in the clear," he said.

Silmari turned and looked at him, while the rest of the command deck sat in stunned silence. Still, the Devaronian did not question; she merely nodded and echoed the command. "You are on," one of the communication techs said. He noted the tech was none other than Chiala Antias—Aleusa's niece.

"This is Tobin Solo Fel Artin, by right of the laws of succession, legitimate Emperor through the line of Princess Sariah Fel. I have learned of an unwarranted attack on the planet Ulicia by Imperial Forces under the direct command of the Usurper, Antius Fel. These forces are openly conducting genocide against the innocent, peaceful people of this agricultural planet. Though I have done all I can to stop this needless slaughter, I do not have sufficient forces to do so at this time. And so I am sending out this plea to any in the Empire who still value justice and truth; who still value lives and freedom. Even if you support the Usurper, no person of good conscience and morals can support the genocide of an entire planet. So help me now. Save the people of Ulicia. Thank you."

"Ships incoming, at least twenty," Silmari reported. "Imperial frigates."

Which still left over twenty ships against their ten. "Order the retreat," Tobin said. He bowed his head as he felt the deaths continue.

~~Last Jedi~~

~~Last Jedi~~

Grand Moff Shol Dinteri stepped over a pile of debris and noticed how the ground crunched under his feet. From his vantage, he was able to see the remains of Ulicia as a blackened, nightmare vista stretching out before him.

Behind him, Grand Admiral Chinlee coughed and adjusted his breath mask against the thick, noxious air.

"It's not the first world we've had to enact a Base Delta Zero command on," Chinlee pointed out.

"It's the first world since I joined the navy that suffered a BDZ while not openly engaging in revolt against the throne," Shinteri said. "They were Unitarians. Baroli descent."

"Yes, Moff Halastrin despised Unitarians." Chinlee stressed the past tense, as Halastrin was on his way to a public beheading on Corusca. Though the moff had done nothing many other moffs had not done in their sectors, he got caught doing it. The political mess was such that the Emperor had no choice but to find a scapenerf, and Halastrin was that nerf.

"How many?" Dinteri asked.

"My understanding was seven hundred million at the end."

"And casualties to Halastrin?"

"The Moff lost eight ships to S'Artin's attack, but more disturbingly another seven are unaccounted for. It appears that they broke formation and simply left. Command is attempting to track them, but it appears the captains removed or tampered with the ship transponder units."

"Well, since that alone is a capitol offense, their intent seems clear enough," Dinteri said. The news of defections was far more terrifying than the fact that a man he helped elevate to moff was soon to loose his head in a public square.

"There was more rioting on Corusca," Chinlee added. "And for the first time, Corella reported wide-spread rioting as well. In fact, many Core Worlds experienced rioting after S'Artin's message."

"He turned the Ulicians into martyrs," Dinteri said.

"And yet we killed them," Chinlee said.

"This is not going to end well, Taklon. Somehow in the course of one damned holonet message S'Artin went from the number one public enemy to a hero."

"And the Emperor to a Usurper," Chinlee said.

The two leaders—the senior Grand Admiral of the Empire, and the senior Grand Moff—stood alone together a good thirty meters away from the trooper escort and shuttle that brought them to the surface. Additionally, like all highly ranked members of the government, each wore sonic scramblers that made eavesdropping almost impossible.

"Hershied has joined him," Dinteri said at last. "I received a coded message under her ID on the Gold channel."

"Did she say anything else?"

"No, only that she and the Princess were safe, and that she believed his claim."

Chinlee clucked his tongue behind the mask. "We trained her better than that."

"That's the point, Taklon. We did train her, and she is smart enough not to fall for lies. We both know she was going to be my successor when I retired." Though it was the first time he admitted it openly, it was not a secret to either man. "Tell me, my friend, has anything trickled up through the ranks?"

Chinlee nodded. "Dissatisfaction. The Navy has enjoyed a good public image for centuries. We are the good guys. Morale took a blow with the public outing of this massacre. I've also learned that the Security Directorate has begun seeding agents and taking a more active role. There have already been hundreds of arrests of officers and enlisted personnel for sedition. Trials are being held at the directorate. So far, everyone one arrested has been found guilty and executed."

The directorate would not take action like that without the Emperor's order. "Between us," Dinteri said softly, "where do you stand?"

"For better or for worse, I have served Antius Huun Fel for the past thirty years with pride. He has suffered with the loss of his daughter, but he is still the Emperor and whatever else may happen, he has earned my loyalty."

"He has been a good Emperor overall," Dinteri agreed. "But he has been different since Mariha left."

"That I can't argue with."

Dinteri took another long look at the devastation before turning and walking back to the shuttle with his friend.

~~Last Jedi~~

~~Last Jedi~~

Dubrillion was a somber world in the week following the massacre of Ulicia.

Mariah was expecting to find herself in a gilded cage, and so was surprised when Captain Bard flew her personally to the planet surface and showed her a newly constructed home on the edge of a huge inland sea that was to be her private residence for herself and her handmaidens.

"The Grand Moff wishes you to know that you are free to go anywhere you wish," the captain said as he showed her in. "Since you have your own staff I won't be assigning anyone, however I have requisitioned a speeder for your use if you wish to explore the planet. If you need any material, I've left contact information for Admiral Santari's office. Since this is still a primarily military world, requisitions still go through the Navy."

"Thank you, Captain," the princess said.

In the days that followed, she explored her new home. The house itself was well if plainly appointed. It was not up to the luxuries of the palace, but then again it was, as Bard said, a military world. The home did sport several local holonet relays for entertainment and news, a fully functioning kitchen with a home service droid, and ten large, well appointed rooms.

Over the next day, she and her handmaidens made a point of exploring the headquarters of the Sestian Navy (she still didn't know why it was called that and no one would tell her). Everyone greeted her civilly, and in some cases with awe similar to what she encountered on the ship. At no point did anyone try to restrict her access to any part of the sprawling, quickly expanding building.

The overall impression she had was of excitement and determination. Everyone worked hard—she didn't see any of the lackadaisical laziness that she occasionally saw when she and her father toured the occasional naval base. Everyone had a job and seemed genuinely eager to do it.

She was in the naval building when news came of Ulicia. She stood amidst a large group of blue and green-haired humans who watched a wall-sized display of a holonet screen as one of the few independent news agencies relayed Tobin's plea for help. Then they showed distant news satellite footage of the final destruction of the planet surface.

She heard sniffs and tears and realized that the people around her were Ulician. It was their home world they just watched die, and their grief was palpable. More than palpable—it was overwhelming. She found herself weeping along with them, and was so caught up in the pain of those around her that she did not flinch or even care when someone simply hugged her, seeking both to receive and give what comfort they could.

The next day, the day Tobin and his fleet were due to return, Mariha left the house as the distant white-yellow sun rose over the horizon, and walked barefoot along the ocean. The water lapping at her feet felt cold, but she did not mind. She knew Slana would be upset at her for not taking an escort, but the truth is she felt oddly safe on this world.

She did not walk for long before she found Aaris again, sitting cross-legged on an outcropping of rock. Two other children sat with him, both older. A sandy-headed man stood a fair distance away from the clumping of children, dividing his attention between the sunrise and the children. She found herself walking to him slowly.

He saw her when she was a few feet away and scrambled to his feet. "Uhhh, hello, your highness!"

"Good morning," she said. "May I know your name?"

"I'm…Danton Tierri, highness."

"Please, for this morning at least, call me Mariha. I'm pretending not to be a princess at the moment."

He smiled nervously. "Okay."

She looked past him at the children. "I know Aaris mentioned two children from Bespin. Are those your children, then?"

"Yes. I had to watch the magistrate strap them into the death chairs," he said in a thick voice. "But Tobin saved them. He saved all of us. What can you do to thank someone for doing that?"

"What do you do?"

"Well, now I'm working at the shipyards while my wife is managing the hypermatter reactor. We've been allowed to split our work-time to make sure one of us is with the kids. Tobin's standing orders are that parents be allowed time with their kids."

"That's…what is that?"

In the center of the three children was what looked like a hologram of an older woman talking to them.

"It's a Jedi holocron," Danton said. "I've never even heard of one before myself, but Tobin said it was a family heirloom."

She nodded her thanks and walked toward the children. The two Tierri children looked up in shock to see the Imperial Princess. Aaris turned and waved. "Hi!" he said. "Wanna join us? We're doing meditation exercises with Master Solo."

"Solo?" Mariha whispered. She stepped onto the rock outcropping and sat down after smiling reassuringly at the startled Tierri children. The holocron seemed self-aware enough to notice her presence.

The princess saw a woman in her eighties, with long white hair and a face lined by age and heavy responsibility. She nodded somberly at the Princess. "You are old to be an initiate, but I understand the Force is with you. What is your name, child?"

"Mariha Jana Fel," she said. She was surprised at how soft her voice sounded.

She was more surprised by the smile that appeared on the old Jedi's face. "Named after your ancestor, no doubt. Mariha Jana Fel, I am Jedi Master Leia Organa Skywalker Solo, sister to Grand Master Luke Skywalker, daughter of Jedi Master Anakin Skywalker, and mother of Empress Jaina Solo Fel—in a very real sense I am your ultimate grandmother, as I am to your cousin Tobin."

Jaina felt her stomach twist. "It's all true, isn't it?" she said. "Everything Tobin told me." She reached into her robes and removed the lightsaber Tobin had given her.

The holocron image nodded. "Yes, dear child, that was Jaina's lightsaber. She was just under fourteen when she built it under her Uncle Luke's tutelage."

"Were you…were you close?"

Sadness crossed the aged face. "Not as close as I should have been, or wanted to be. I had three children. The first I lost to the Vong. The second I lost to the Dark Side of the Force. And the third I lost to the Empire. For while she remained Jedi her whole life, once Jaina wed Jagged Fel, her heart belonged wholly to him, and his vision of the future for his people. I never knew my grandchildren from her line, though I wished to with all my heart. It was not meant to be. But life was not wholly without love. Before he fell completely to Darkness, Jaina's twin Jacen did have a daughter, Allana. After Jaina was forced to kill him, my husband and I raised her as our own, and through her we found hope again. It was she who brokered the peace between the Empire and the Alliance that continued unbroken until the Sith Lord Darth Krayt betrayed both sides, and set the final stage for the purges that lead to where we are now. This much I have learned from Tobin."

Mariha could only nod as she accepted this most personal of history lessons. "Tobin wishes to marry me and take the throne."

"He does what he must by the will of the Force," Leia said.

"You speak as if it is alive."

"It is, child. The Force is directed by the lives of all throughout the galaxy. It is created by life itself, and while life exists it can never fade. It is guided by the minds of all those who came before, and all those who might come again. And so in that regard there is a type of intelligence behind the Force. A huge, ponderous intelligence that can guide even the smallest of feet, if we but listen. Tobin has listened, and has been placed on a perilous path. He is walking the crest of faith itself. If he missteps, the crest of the people's faith will crush him. But if he is successful, that faith will wash away the sins that have haunted your empire for these last few centuries."

"What do you mean?"

"The Jedi have always had faith in the Force, for to us it is part of who we are. And in eons past the people of the galaxy had faith in the Jedi. But never have so many worshipped the Force itself as today. It has become a religion, one the original Jedi Order would never have approved of, because only with religion can Tobin hope to change the Empire. He has personally ignited the flames of fanaticism, and now he must tread carefully to keep from being burned."

Mariha gasped as the true impact of Leia's words struck. The awe of those on the ship flashed vividly in her mind. Slana told her about the Unitarian meeting before their rescue attempt. She saw herself the riots that crippled the Imperial Quarter of Corusca.

"Did he create the religion?" she asked.

"No. The Force itself guided its formation, anticipating Tobin's arrival. He is the Chosen One, the one to bring balance to the Force. But balance is perilous and difficult to maintain. Always there have been Jedi and Sith. The concept of the Unifying Force, that is, the idea of the Force being without light or darkness, was never popular among either Jedi or Sith. They defined themselves by their actions and sides. Light, dark. Good, evil. Tobin has trained as both Jedi and Sith. He has combined the strengths of both, while doing his best not to be shaped by their mutual weaknesses. He is the living embodiment of the Unifying Force. The faith he will lead must maintain that delicate balance. Those who fall out of balance will have to be destroyed for the sake of the whole. For once balance is lost, the Universe once again will fall into savagery and war."

"And we will learn this balance?"

"Tobin will teach you, yes," Leia said. "In the meantime, I am here to guide your first steps into the Force. Will you agree to learn, last daughter of my line?"

"Yes," Mariha said without hesitation.

"Then close your eyes, and we will begin."

~~Last Jedi~~

~~Last Jedi~~

Tobin walked along the beach with a visibly upset Slana and a squad of handmaidens. He had taken his shoes off to feel the water. His expression was neutral, and hid the pain he felt for his complete failure to save the Ulicia people. Despite his capture by Hershied, his gambit at Bespin nabbed both a hypermatter production facility and saved two Force-sensitive children. His capture was merely a price to pay.

But Ulicia was nothing less than failure. He tried with all his might to save a world, and went away with one less ship and seven hundred million souls weighing down his conscience. He didn't know what guided him to Mariah's home. It's not like the two of them were close friends. They'd had only a few conversations, and those were tense at best. Yet he went, only to find an upset group of women looking for her as well.

It only took a taste of the Force to know where she was. So he took his shoes off and walked along the beach, knowing Slana and the others would follow. Soon enough he came across Danton Tierri, his two children, Tobin's apprentice, and the Princess herself sitting on a rock listening to the soothing voice of a dead Jedi master teaching them about meditation.

He turned to the women. "There she is. You should return to the house now. Her training is just beginning."

Slana sent the other girls back, but refused to leave herself. Instead, she sat beside a startled Danton while Tobin walked to the rock. Mariah said nothing, though she nodded to him. The kids, though, all smiled and waved at him as he joined their circle.

"You look troubled, last son of my line," Master Solo said.

"I was unable to save a world," Tobin said. "The weight of their deaths is heavy."

"It is a hard lesson to learn—that we cannot save everyone."

"It is indeed. What were we learning today?"

"Meditation, of course. Join us."

"I will, thank you."

The four spend the rest of the afternoon on the rock, learning to reach out and feel the Force around them.


	39. Wookiee's Revenge

Chapter 38 review responses are available in my forums. Thank you all for reading.

* * *

**Chapter Thirty-Nine: Wookiee's Revenge **

"Chabacala sends word, they're ready."

Tobin nodded at Slana, who looked distinctly uncomfortable in her uniform. "I still don't know why I'm here."

"Because Mariha asked you to?"

"I'm not one of your officers!"

"For the duration of this mission you are," Tobin said. His tone was flat, and Slana visibly fought to school her features.

"Yes, sir."

"See, that wasn't so hard." He stepped past her to the tactical station of the _Miraluka_, a restored _Scythe_-class heavy cruiser. Though slightly smaller than the _Pelleaons_, the Alliance ships were designed to go toe-to-toe with the most powerful warships ever made. "How stands the fleet?"

"Fleet reports ready, sir," Lieutenant Chiala Antias said. She no longer gulped nervously when Tobin was near, and he appreciated her growing confidence. She was twenty, now, and showed every sign of being a competent officer. After all, her Aunt Aleusa was very competent. Cold-hearted and murderous, but very competent.

"And Vilmarn's people?"

"Report ready," Slana said in a carefully neutral voice.

Tobin nodded and walked back to the central command station, sitting on top of the high captain's seat. Unlike the Imperial ships that had sunken stations that the commanders walked over, the bridge of the _Miraluka_ was a single level and bristling with officers and staff. Tobin tapped into the main tactical read on his command console and saw the other ships in the fleet. He opened a secured laser-communication with them.

"This is S'Artin. After today, we will no longer be pirates. We will no longer be thorns in their side. We are about to declare formal, open war against the false Emperor. After today, we will BE the Empire, and they will be the Usurpers. The Force is with us, and victory will be ours. Long live the Empire!"

He cut off the communications, and said, "All ships, attack."

~~Last Jedi~~

~~Last Jedi~~

Admiral Garsh was enjoying dinner with his wife of twenty two years when the alarm went off.

"Dale, what is that?" Madame Garsh said, having never before heard the sound at any time during their long, loving marriage.

"A mistake, I'm sure," the Admiral said smoothly as he lifted his communicator to his mouth. "This is Garsh, what is the meaning of this?"

"Admiral, please report to command!" came a harried voice. "Our weapons platforms are being fired upon by enemy vessels."

Garsh's eyes widened. "Status?"

"One of the platforms has been destroyed, sir. We've also lost two frigates and three slave transports have been captured with enemy interdictors. Ten capital ships, some matching the description of ships that attacked Corusca two months ago."

Gash did the calculation in his head and realized they were in danger. To his wife he said, "Lin, pack an emergency bag and go to my shuttle. I'll have the pilot take you the surface shortly."

Lin Garsh's eyes widened. "Dale?"

"There is a danger. Go."

He turned and ran from the room, leaving his stunned wife to pack. He caught a monorail from his quarters and fled through the station, noting the panicked expressions on the faces of the officers and their families. He finally arrived and ran into the command area.

He was just in time to see a Golan XIII weapons platform bloom in fire before what could only be a superlaser.

S'Artin, then.

"Shields are up but are taking a beating," Captain Desters reported when he saw the admiral arrive. "We can't take a hit from that superlaser, though."

"Our forces?"

"The frigates did not have time to launch their fighters. We launched ours, but all have been destroyed."

Garsh ran to the tactical station, where he saw ten ships, including five modern Imperial frigates, and four ships right of the history books, and a converted Ithorian luxury liner with a jury-rigged superlaser pointed right at them.

Desters paled. "Sir, we're being hailed by someone claiming to be the Emperor."

"Put him on, Desters."

A hologram appeared in the middle of the command center. The figure appeared young but powerful. "Whom am I addressing?"

"I am Admiral Dale Garsh, Commander, Kashyyyk Authority."

"Admiral, I am Tobin Solo Fel Artin, by grace of birth and the Force rightful Emperor of the Galactic Empire. And right now, you are at my mercy. Surrender, or be destroyed."

"Why did you attack this world?"

One elegant brow rose. "I am not attacking Kashyyyk, Admiral. I am liberating her children. The world of Kashyyyk has been so devastated that it cannot even properly support the few Wookiees you have allowed to live on it. And so I am taking them away to freedom. If you surrender, I will allow you and your people to relocate to the surface. When the population has been transported to safety, I will leave you and your people in peace."

"Sir!" Desters hissed. "Wookiee slave transports are inbound."

"How many?"

"All of them, at a guess. It's as if he's managed to capture every slave transport in the galaxy."

"Not all. Two resisted and were destroyed," the hologram of the supposed "emperor" said. "I wish to spare as many lives as possible. I do not blame those who follow the Usurper. After all, it was his ancestor who usurped the throne. For this reason, Admiral, I truly do wish you to surrender. But right now, I have four hundred years of sins to atone for with the Wookiees for the crimes committed against them by my cousins. This is the first step to restore them to the freedom they deserve. What say you, Admiral?"

"If I surrender, I will be executed."

"If you resist, your wife will die with you," the rebel said.

Dale felt as if someone had struck him. "How…?" He closed his eyes, stiffened his back, and said coldly, "With the promise that none aboard this station will be harmed, you have my surrender, sir."

"Very good. You have one hour to evacuate the station. The system holonet relay node has been destroyed. All communications out of system are blocked. I will provide further instructions if required."

The hologram blinked off. "Admiral?" Desters said, stunned.

"Let the record show that I acted solely upon my own recognizance. Under the Uniform Articles, all officers and enlisted personnel are sheltered from any prosecution or retaliatory actions taken as a result of my orders." He turned to Desters. "So no one else has to lose their head over this. Begin the evacuation. I will go down in my personal shuttle with my wife."

Desters nodded once. "I'm sorry, sir." He pulled his side arm and fired. Garsh did not even have time to speak before he fell dead to the floor.

Desters turned and faced the stunned bridge. "By direct order of His Imperial Majesty, no Naval forces may surrender or accept quarter from the usurper named Tobin S'Artin. The Security Directorate officers are authorized to shoot any officer, regardless of rank, who ignore this order. Gunners, prepare to fire on the transport ships as they fly past."

~~Last Jedi~~

~~Last Jedi~~

Tobin shook his head. "They're going to fire on us," he said with certainty.

Slana stared. "How do you know?"

"Because I just felt the admiral die." He walked back to his command station. "_Sword of Stars, _this is S'Artin."

"Yes, Tobin," came Silmari's purring voice. Even after a year in uniform, she could not bring herself to call him by his title.

"The admiral who surrendered has been killed. They are going to fire on the transports. Have the _Chalsetor_ fly escort with the first transport as it moves past the station. The moment the Imperials fire, take them out."

"Affirmative," she said. Tobin switched his monitors over to tactical and watched as the _Chalsetor,_ a recent defector, moved between one of the massive slave transports and the station's turbolaser cannons. The ship was just in time, as the station's weapons opened up.

One shot got through and slammed into the transport, but the _Chalsetor_ took the worst brunt of it. A second after the first shot was fired, the _Sword of Stars_ fired its superlaser. The bright green beam burned through the station's shields. With a single shot, a station that housed almost half a million Imperials ceased to exist.

Tobin shook his head. "Fools." He activated a direct channel. "_Chalsetor, _status?"

"We remain operational, Sire," came the captain's response. "Transport is reporting some structural damage, but not enough to prevent it from doing it's job."

"Very good, captain. Excellent work." He opened up a broad signal. "This is the Emperor. Begin loading procedures."

~~Last Jedi~~

~~Last Jedi~~

Grand Moff Shol Dinteri watched with a placid face as seven hundred people, mostly non-commissioned personnel and a sprinkling of officers, were marched into the parade grounds of the Naval Academy on Bastion by Security Directorate black-guards. The guards, wearing a pure-black variant of trooper armor, carried the most powerful repeater blaster gauntlets the Empire made.

Beside him, Admiral Chinlee stood at stiff attention, his face set like stone.

The magistrate in his purple robes marched out into the parade grounds and started reading from a data pad in his hands. "Under Imperial Security Dictate 43 issued by his Imperial Majesty, you have all been found guilty of mutiny or conspiracy to commit mutiny, treason, and conspiracy to commit treason. The sentence for your crimes is death, to be carried out by firing squad. Marksmen, you may fire when ready."

By this time, many of the condemned, at least the conscripted recruits, were crying out in terror, or calling for their families. Most were children themselves, mainly teenagers freshly picked off the streets of rim worlds where the Imperial Senate would not receive too many complaints regarding the conscription gangs.

The black-guards opened fire with gauntlets that could fire seven hundred blaster bolts a minute. It took less than sixty seconds for all the prisoners to die. The last was a seventeen year old girl from Antarin III conscripted on her way to school. Her parents were known Unitarians, and she was crying for them as the trooper put one last blaster bolt into her skull.

Dinteri knew who she was because he had read the personnel files of every person accused. He fought to hold the tears back as he, Chinlee and the other members of the Moff College turned and walked back into the Executive Briefing room.

The assembled leaders of the Empire settled into their seats in the auditorium as Diktat Amorine Hubrin stalked onto the stage. The leader of the Security Directorate was a woman of forty nine years of age—exceedingly young for a directorate head—with short-cropped hair still turning from blond to silver. She carried her age well, as all Imperial executives were expected to, and walked with the quiet assurance of absolute, terrifying authority. This woman ruled the Empire's secret police.

"What you have just witnessed has become appallingly mundane," she said in a rolling contralto voice. "Navy Central Command is reporting two defection attempts among ship captains a week, for the second straight month. Even while voluntary recruitment has dropped off at a precipitous level, requiring us to increase conscription efforts, we are having to execute a record number of personnel for treason or mutiny. The ultimate responsibility for all this lies in your laps."

She was looking at the Grand Moffs in particular, but Shol felt her gaze especially, and stifled an urge to shoot the woman.

"Faced with these unpleasant facts, and the recent debacles at Kashyyyk and Corusca, the Emperor has enacted new security protocols and changed the hierarchy of the directorates. Effective immediately, the Navy will now report up through the Security Directorate…"

Half the room rose to their feet, screaming at the sheer ludicrousness of having the Navy authority report through a spy bureau. Shol, though, knew exactly what was happening. Because of Hershied, the Emperor did not trust his own moffs any more.

The roaring of the crowd died abruptly as fifty black guards marched into the room and pointed their gauntlets at the assembled moffs and admirals.

"This is not a discussion," Hubrin said. Her amplified voice echoed coldly through the room. "These orders come directly from His Majesty. Failure to comply will be viewed as treason and will be punished accordingly. All of you are to have your families report to Bastion in the next week, and you will not be allowed to resume your duties until that time. Families that fail to report will be marked as enemies of the Empire and will be hunted down."

The blatant threat in her words killed any further protest. Shol revised his opinion—not only did the Empire not trust his Moffs, he distrusted them so much he was going to take hostages.

"This is…intolerable," Taklon Chinlee whispered, almost thrumming with outrage. "Never in the history of the Reborn Empire has this occurred. The moffs have always reported directly to the Emperor!"

"It's effective," Shol said quietly, while the spy master below continued to outline the new way of life in the Empire. "Most of us have family here or on Corusca."

"Your family is already here, are they not?"

"I have a daughter attending the Corulag Academy," he said. "She is on her training cruise. My youngest is attending University on Corusca. But otherwise all are here."

Finally the painful meeting ended. Shol noticed the stunned expressions on his fellows as they left the Academy auditorium. He himself walked briskly toward the office he and most other Moffs maintained on the world that was often called the Womb of the Empire. For it was from Bastion that the modern Empire rose.

Bastion also maintained the largest and most prestigious of the training academies. Those who wanted to one day became moffs or admirals attended the Bastion Naval Academy, while those who, like his daughter, wanted to go into technical trades such as medicine or programming, tended to go to Corulag.

The moffs maintained offices and staffs to better facilitate recruitment to their individual areas. Poaching of top academy talent was a game almost as old as the Moff College. Unfortunately, this year had one of the smallest graduating classes in the academy's history, and those getting through were most certainly not worth poaching.

Shol's staff stood at attention as he entered, and he put them at ease with a nod as he made his way to his office. He stepped in, closed his door, and then activated his anti-surveillance fields. The fields indicated five new monitoring devices in his office since just that morning.

He made a point of pulling out a data pad while surreptitiously pulling a small comlink as well. He activated it while pretending to make a verbal dictation to the pad. With his fields in place, the monitoring devices would not be able to make out his words regardless of how many droid brains were dedicated to the task, and it distorted visuals too much for lip-reading.

"Shol?" his wife's voice emerged from the comlink; she sounded strained. "I need you to come home. Now."

Shol felt a cold fist of fear forming in his stomach. "I'll be there soon."

He quickly left his offices, but did not fail to notice a pair of black guards fall in behind him. He stopped abruptly and turned to face them. "Can I help you?"

Neither responded. Shol looked over to the troopers on duty. "Troopers, please escort these men out of the building, preferably by the west Entrance."

The four troopers moved to surround the two black guards, who still had not moved. One of them said, "That is a mistake, Dinteri."

"I am Grand Moff Dinteri, commissioned by his Imperial Majesty. Until I receive written notice to the contrary, you will address me correctly or I will have you both shot for insubordination. Troopers, take them."

The black guards must have sensed the grand moff was not in a mood to bluff and did not struggle as the four troopers escorted them out. Dinteri went the opposite direction. He signaled and moments later his personal security escort and aide were waiting for him with his speeder.

"Home, all speed," he said brusquely.

He arrived home just ten minutes later and saw again black guards across the street, standing quite openly as they watched his spacious home. He maintained two homes—one on Corusca and one on Bastion. He walked through the carefully tended gardens and through the front door.

His wife Elena was waiting for him just inside the door. For the first time in their marriage, she looked old. Not like Chinlee, who was approaching a century, but with her face warped by fear and worry, she no longer looked like the young woman he married thirty years ago.

With age, though, came wisdom and foresight. "I've activated audio and visual distortion fields throughout the house," she said. "Shol, they've arrested Arabel!"

Shol stopped cold, as if someone had punched him in the stomach. "What for?"

"Come!" Elena led him through the wide entryway and into her personal study. Not only was she the wife of a Grand Moff with her own extensive duties, but she was also former Navy officer herself. She maintained the family finances and handled all personal contracts for them, as well as taking care of their children's separate colleges.

She sank into her repulsor chair and pulled up the holonet image of a young Zabak male. The boy's horns had been shorn down almost to his hairline, which was a new fad among some high-echelon Zabraks trying to emulate high human culture.

She activated the recording. "…they don't get this. I've routed it through enough nodes and I've sent a droid signal sweeper after it. My name is Chalcis and I'm a friend of Arabel's. They came for her—men in black trooper armor. They came for all of us. They kicked down her door and dragged her and both her roommates right out of the room. One of our friends tried to stop him and…" The young man's voice cracked. "They shot him. Right in the face. He just fell over. Tobin told us this could happen—he told us to flee. But Arabel said they wouldn't come after her because of her father. I'm so sorry. I'm….aahhhhh!" The signal ended with the sound of blaster fire.

Shol felt his knees tremble as he sank down into one of the two chairs facing his wife's desk. "There's more," Elena said. Her voice trembled and her eyes were alight.

The next signal was an official naval communication with date stamps and identifications that said Cadet Lieutenant Valera Dinteri. "Mother, this is Valera. Our training cruise has been rerouted to Bastion and the captain has restricted me to my cabin, but he won't tell me why! Please, do you or dad know what's going on?"

Shol lowered his head, fighting the storm of emotion. Elena turned and stared. "What is happening, Shol? Why is the Empire going after our children?"

"The Emperor has tasked the Security Directorate with overseeing all naval operations," Shol said, his voice dead. "And we have been ordered to have our families report to Bastion."

His wife—whom he met in the Academy and who served honorably for five years before they decided his career was advancing faster and quit to be his wife and raise his family—gasped. The spouses of Moffs had strictly assigned roles and duties as well, quite often as important as those of their uniformed spouses. Elena Dinteri knew exactly that it meant to have the Security Directorate in charge. She knew what it meant to have the families of moffs gather in a single location.

"Oh Shol," she whispered. "That explains Valera, but what about Arabel? That young man mentioned Tobin. Is he talking about….?"

"Reports indicate S'Artin had support from the local population when he abducted Princess Mariha. The student protests and marches were a little too coordinated. If she was a part of that… Oh stars, what has she gotten us into?"

"What are they going to do?"

He looked his wife in the eye. "Elena, they just made me watch 700 men and women, some just teenagers younger than Arabel, get executed by firing squad for sedition. If they even think she aided S'Artin, they'll execute her."

Elena's flush vanished and she paled to the color of bone. "Our daughter? You can't let them do that, Shol! She's only nineteen! You're the senior grand moff in the college, you have to do something!"

Shol's eyes automatically sought out the nearest family holo portrait. Arabel, the youngest and most mischievous of their children, smiled impishly across the desk. The picture was taken before his sister in law suffered through a midi-chlorian execution for her only child.

"The Emperor has placed the college under the Security Directorate's authority. He's shut down our access to him. Things are falling apart all over the galaxy, and he doesn't trust anybody right now."

"To hell with him, I want our daughter back!"

Her frantic cry tore him out of his distraction. "Even if the Emperor himself condemns her?"

Her eyes narrowed as the full impact of the statement settled in. Elena calmed herself with obvious effort, and it pained him to see his wife so terribly distraught. He reached across her desk and took her hand in silence.

"You and Chinlee command an oversector fleet," she finally said. "You could summon two thousand ships with a word between you. You have taken meals with the Emperor; he visited us when Anabel was born! You have been his most faithful servant and even his friend for 19 years. And this is how he repays us?" She looked up at the fragile calm cracked. "I don't care if I have to kiss S'Artin's ass, I will not stand-by and do nothing as they kill our daughter, Shol. I can't."

Shol patted her hand. "I know, love. I know. Before we do anything rash, I'm going to speak to the Diktat. Perhaps I can finagle mercy with a promise of cooperation. I don't know. Just finding S'Artin will be a challenge, though I have suspicions."

"Whatever you have to do, Shol, I will support you. I will always support you."

He smiled at her, and despite her age and the stress, she was the most beautiful woman in the universe to him. "Whatever I have to do," he agreed.


	40. Not Without My Daughter

Chapter Thirty-Nine review responses are posted in my forums. Thank you for reading!

* * *

**Chapter Forty: Not Without My Daughter**

Amorine Hubrin listened attentively. She was still on Bastion following her briefing to the Moff College, but would be leaving for Corusca within the next few days.

When he was done, she nodded and made a sympathetic "hmmm" sound before tapping her desk console and reading. "Anabel Dinteri, nineteen standard years of age. Your youngest, correct?"

"That's correct."

"And your oldest is serving as a medical internist cadet on a training cruise, I understand."

"Her ship has been rerouted to Bastion and she is under cabin arrest," Dinteri said.

"Yes. Standard procedure, you see. The family of known Unitarian terrorists are all placed under observation or arrested outright."

Shol felt his heart skip a beat. "What did you say?"

"Anabel Dinteri is a Unitarian. We have surveillance showing her entering a Unitarian Temple repeatedly following S'Artin's escape. We also have surveillance showing she was one of the most ardent protestors in the riots that helped pull resources away from guarding the palace during the abduction of the Princess. Upon interrogation, she made a full confession both of participating in the riots and belonging to the Unitarian faith, as well as personally meeting with Tobin S'Artin and providing him information regarding the Moff College. Information, it might be noted, that came from you, Grand Moff."

Shol, though, stopped listening when she mentioned 'interrogation.' "Is my daughter alive?"

"At the moment, but a warrant for her execution has been issued by the Emperor himself," Hubrin said, again with a sympathetic, sad little smile that stabbed at Shol worse than any vibroblade.

"What must I do?" he asked in a small voice.

"Do? Grand Moff, I don't believe you understand the situation." All pretence of sympathy melted before a look as cold as the outer rim. "Anabel Dinteri is going to die within the week. And because she was able to provide information that assisted S'Artin, information she would not have had if not for you, you are under investigation as well. Your little stunt in the Academy this morning will not be tolerated again. You will not make any effort to avoid your guards. You will cease any jamming within your home or work. You and your family will cooperate in every aspect of this investigation, or I will have you, your wife, and the rest of your children summarily shot. At the very least, you will be losing your position. Now, was there anything else you wish to discuss?"

"Apparently not," he said with effort to control his tone. He stood, turned and walked out of the room. The moment he was back in the hallway, two black guards fell in step behind him. He made his way across the Academy to his own offices without comment.

The troopers on duty, he noted, took a step toward the guards, but Dinteri shook his head and the four men fell back into place. He reached his adjunct, an experienced lieutenant, and said, "Iela, please advise my senior staff to report to me immediately. It needs to be an open meeting."

The lieutenant blinked at him in surprise. "Sir, security protocols…"

"I am under direct orders from the Diktat of the Security Directorate not to use any audio or visual jamming technologies. And so it will be an open meeting." As he spoke, with the two black guards behind him, he used the Naval hand signal meaning _obfuscation_.

The lieutenant nodded. "Very well, sir. We will keep all jamming fields down. But it will require me to tap into the AI since its automatic every time you close the door."

"Then I will keep the door open until you advise me its time. In the meantime, have the senior staff assemble at their earliest convenience."

"Yes, sir."

Taklon Chinlee was the first to arrive, resplendent as always in his white Grand Admiral's uniform. While Shol was the senior grand moff, Taklon was senior grand admiral and, along with Shol, controlled not just the over-sector fleet, but also served as head of fleet operations. Technically, Shol outranked him, but their positions were so high that any disagreements would be more political than military.

Fortunately, they were both the best of friends. Next came Admirals Shanda Hastile, Admiral Boortins and Moff Kerr Maric, Dila Hershied's replacement and, like Hershied, a long-time protégé of Dinteri's.

"We must wait until my assistant has finished deactivating the recording equipment," Dinteri said when the others noticed the door was still open. "I will explain later, but it is necessary that this be an open meeting."

A moment later, Lieutenant Iela appeared. "It is ready, sir. No jamming equipment will activate. Whoever is monitoring the room will see and hear your entire meeting."

"Excellent, thank you, Iela."

She winked, to the confusion of the senior staff, and slipped the door closed.

"Something we need to tell Elena, Shol?" Chinlee asked slyly.

Shanda Hastile snorted. "This coming from the man who's had more wives than most Cereans."

"And not a one of them was left wanting," Chinlee said with an outrageous wink. "It's not too late for you, Dear Shanda."

"I don't date within the ranks, Taklon. And the fifty-year age difference is a bit of a factor as well."

"A shame," Taklon said. He then looked at Shol and signed, _Is it safe?_

"It's safe," Shol said. "Iela is routing a recording of last week's meeting into the observers with an altered date stamp. It's current enough to be of interest." He took a deep breath. "They are going to kill my youngest daughter."

All humor fled the assembled officers as Dinteri told them what was happening. "Anabel is facing an execution warrant. Valera is being held essentially as a prisoner. Last night we pulled Sandick and Sholin out of school and have them home. It is likely I am going to be ousted within the week if Hubrin has her way. In the meantime, I and my family are under constant surveillance."

Without a word, Taklon stood and left the table. He stepped to the bar at the far end of the room and began making drinks. He returned with a tray of Corellian whiskey shots, and very deliberately gave a shot glass to each of the assembled staff. He then downed it.

"I've told my kids to take their families and go into hiding," the grand admiral finally said. "In so many words, of course."

Moff Maric, a man of forty-two years, most of which was spent in the military, downed his as well. "I have no family to lose," he said. "You've been my patron since you snagged me out of the academy, Shol. As much as my own work, I owe you my successes. We're not going to let them kill Anabel, are we?"

"'Course not, lad!" Chinlee said. "Do we have any dependable assets on Corusca?"

"We have one division," Hastile said. "Mixed troopers and marines. I was actually coming to advise you that transfer orders came through ordering me to remove them from the planet."

Shol shared a look at Taklon, who grinned. "Seems the perfect cover, doesn't it?"

"Can we do it? The Directorate prisons…"

"Are a civilian operation," Taklon continued. "We are the Imperial Navy."

"Are we?" Shol asked.

Taklon poured himself another shot. "Shol, do you remember the Oath of Ascension?"

Shol blinked in surprise. "The Emperor's oath?"

"'_I_ _do so swear to give my life and loyalty to the people of the Galactic Empire_…' Those are the first words of the oath Antias Fel took when he ascended to the throne. I was there—just a lowly captain, of course, but I was on Corusca when the old emperor died and Antias took it. He was a commissioned officer himself before his ascension. He of all people should know better than to place the moff college under the aegis of a civilian spy agency. He should know better than to flout the laws for his own child while enforcing them harshly for all others. If he felt so strong when Mariah was born, bless her, he should have changed the law then. It's never been a popular law—he would have had sufficient support. But no, he lied and violated the sacred trust of his people. And now this…he knows you, Shol. He was there at Anabel's birth, for Star's sake! This I cannot abide. Perhaps S'Artin is right. Perhaps it is the Force that compels us. After all, Hershied defected to him, and she was no fool."

"No, no she wasn't," Hastile agreed.

"I can't know any details," Shol said. "If they suspect me of taking action, they will kill my whole family before anything can happen."

"You won't know a thing until it's accomplished," Hastile said.

"And when we have her out?" Maric asked.

"Then we try to find Hershied," Shol said, "and see if S'Artin is interested in some more help."

~~Last Jedi~~

~~Last Jedi~~

The Imperial Medical Ship _Mercy_ did not look like a standard frigate format. Medical ships were actually modified transports that looked more like rounded beetles than daggers. This was because of the ship's varied role and need to dock with other, larger ships.

At two hundred meters, the _Mercy_ was smaller than most frigates or corvettes. It sported four turbolaser batters, an ion canon emplacement, but over a dozen tractor emitters for ease in rescue operations.

In a small cabin, Cadet Lieutenant Valera Dinteri tried reading through another medical manual, but was having difficulty concentrating. A ship's marine stood outside her cabin, and she was not allowed to leave at all. They were slated to reach Bastion in just a few hours. This was her second day of confinement, and the suspense was driving her insane.

She didn't even know why.

The air around her shattered before the loud clarion of the ship's alarm. She ran to her small viewport, and was stunned to see two frigates almost on top of them. She braced herself as the whole ship shuddered violently under the impact of enemy fire, and it was all Valera could do not to cry. It was obviously the Pretender's forces attacking, but why would he fire on a medical ship?

The clarion stopped but the overhead lights continued to flash red. Valera sat on the edge of her narrow cot, clutching her reader to her chest possessively, as if seeking comfort from the device. After a few minutes that felt as if they were hours, the door opened to reveal a short, Mirialan woman with rich dark skin. She wore a standard physician's uniform with a captain's rank, but odd blue stripes down her slacks.

"Valera Dinteri?"

Valera sat up. "Yes?"

"Please come with me."

Hesitantly, Valera followed the other woman and noted her marine guard was gone. In fact, the hall of the personnel suites was completely empty. "What's happening? Who are you?"

"My name is Doctor Shina Bootha. We're rescuing you."

"Rescuing?"

"Do you have a sister named Anabel?"

Valera closed her eyes briefly. "Oh stars, what's the little brat down now?"

"She stood up for what is right, and is now facing execution," Shina said.

Valera stumbled but righted herself. "That's impossible. Our father…."

She stopped when she reached the bridge and found the enter crew of the _Mercy_ on their knees with their hands behind their heads. On the others side of the small bridge was a stack of five bodies—all in Directorate black.

In the space between was someone she thought she would never see again. "Dila?"

Dila Hershied turned and smiled at Valera. "My goodness, you've grown!" the older woman said. "Beautiful and a doctor! You must be fighting the men off with a vibroaxe."

"What…what are you doing here?"

"Well, originally we came to save you, but while we're here we'll probably take the ship as well. His Majesty, Emperor Artin, has a strict policy regarding medical personnel as prisoners. As long as no one resists, we'll let them all go or, if they wish, recruit them into the New Empire. Eventually. Except for you. We need to talk."

~~Last Jedi~~

~~Last Jedi~~

Shanda Hastile blew a lock of black hair from her eyes as they went through the tightened security requirements for her ship, the _Desolate,_ to enter orbit. Space around the galactic capital was bristling with over a hundred ships with dark gray hulls similar to the old empire. The ships were larger than the standard frigates, measuring a thousand meters in length, and near bristled with armaments. They were all fresh off the assembly line and did not show up in the Fleet Catalogue at all.

It eventually came down to an out-and-out interrogation of her, the admiral, personally by a subdiktat before her ship was allowed to assume an orbital position. Even then, two of the new class of ships assumed ominous positions directly above them.

"Admiral, we're receiving a message," her captain, a loyal Mon Cal named Terfpen, reported. "General Reeger reports the division is ready for transport."

"Very good, captain. Report to orbit control that we are taking the frigate down for loading."

The captain gave the Mon Cal version of a nod and turned to relay the order, while on the ship's tactical relay she watched the two directorate escorts stay directly over the smaller Naval frigate. Through the command deck's viewports, she could see plasma flickering about the ship shields as they entered the atmosphere in a slow, controlled re-entry.

Vary cautiously, Terfpen walked to the admiral's side. "There are over twenty turbolaser cannons and two ion cannons on the surface tracking us," the captain said quietly. "They are treating us like an enemy vessel."

Hastile met the captain's large, amphibious eyes and said, "I know."

Finally the ship settled into its cradle at the naval space port, some twenty kilometers from the army barracks where the division to be moved was housed. "Captain," Hastile said, "would you be so good as to go fetch our people?"

"At once, Admiral."

To the many eyes watching the _Desolate_, the ramp which unloaded the transport train was not remarkable at all. The train began to fly toward the docks, ready to move the first of their troopers. The train itself was composed of five large transport cars, each twenty meters long and connected with energy couplings. As soon as the train left the space port it fell into one of the many streams of civilian traffic that criss-crossed the planet-sized city. A pair of directorate followed at a safe distance, keeping a close eye on the cargo train.

The drones did not see the bottom of three of the cars open as three speeder cars fell into the constant stream of traffic. When the traffic stream diverted, there was nothing to make the drones, or the people watching through them, follow the three perfectly ordinary civilian speeders that turned away with the rest of the normal traffic flow.

Inside the speeders, a select group of commandoes, led by a man who had been hand-picked Shol Dinteri from the academy, slowly began arming themselves. All wore trooper armor that was painted with a glossy black sheen.

Army Captain Bel Gaer was twenty-four years old. He served on Dinteri's personal detail for a year fresh out of the academy and remembered the then fifteen-year-old Arabel as a beautiful, mischievous girl with a sparkling laugh. He thought she was among the most beautiful girls he'd ever seen, and knew she was so far out of his league that it was dangerous to even look at her. And now, four years later, he was going to save her life.

Bel Gaer knew exactly what was happening. Hastile brought him in as soon as they left Bastion orbit so that they could begin routing out potential Directorate spies. All personnel who came aboard the ship after the princess's abduction were suspect, and as soon as they entered hyperspace those personnel were quietly reassigned and closely monitored.

The troopers escorting him now were all veterans of the Grand Moff's personal career taken from all over the fleet. None were less than a sergeant, most were sergeant majors or above. There were no new troopers.

"Let's get ready to go."

"Captain," the lead driver said over Gaer's helmet. "Get up here, sir!"

Gaer jumped and ran toward the front of the car and looked out onto the black cube that was the Directorate headquarters. The headquarters was surrounded by a huge, angry mob that seemed to actually be fighting with the perimeter guards.

"Hell, this might be easier than we thought," Gaer said. "Do we know the directorate's frequency?"

"Yes, sir."

"Patch me through."

A moment later a small hologram of a dishelved directorate corporal said. "We don't have time for these…who are you?"

"Captain Del Debbers, Corporal. I have a squad of twenty men that have just come on duty in three civilian cars to assist."

"That'll help short term until the black guards arrive. Come around to the back lot."

"Will do."

"This is a big coincidence," the pilot said.

"Maybe. Maybe not. Let's go."

The three cars flew around to the back of the facility to a lot secured by force fields. The field dropped long enough for the three cars to land before rising. Four black guards rushed forward, but seemed to relax when they saw the black armor pouring out.

"Tell us where you need us," Gaer said in his most sincere 'I want to help you' voice.

"Come on," one of the black guards said before turning to lead them into the building. His squad made it all the way into the wide, central hall before nearly fifty white-armored troopers emerged from either side of the hall. The lead black guard turned and pulled off his helmet to reveal a handsome human male with dark hair.

"Drop your weapons or die," he said simply.

"You're not Directorate," Gaer said.

"And you're not very smart, are you?" Just then Gaer heard a commotion from the far end of the hall and almost felt his breath stop when he saw Anabel Dinteri at the head of a long line of beaten, wretched-looking people. Her face was drawn and bruised, her clothes torn, and the sparkle of mischievous humor was gone from her face, replaced by a shadow of horror.

"Who are you?" Gaer demanded.

The man shook his head. "Drop your weapons now."

"Do it," Gaer said, realizing something very strange was going on. He disconnected his blaster gauntlet from the sleeve of his armor, and let it fall with his pack to the floor. He heard the other men following suit. He then removed his helmet as Anabel got closer.

"Anabel Dinteri," he said.

His captor looked at him with narrowed eyes and the troopers around him tensed, but Anabel stumbled a little and stared at him. "I know you," she said. Her voice was hoarse and cracked, as if she had been screaming for hours and hours. "Where do I know you from?"

"I flew you to your Cotillion Ball when your father had to deal with the plague outbreak of Chiris III. I was up for transfer a few weeks later."

Her eyes widened in memory. "Bel?"

"Yes."

She took a step toward him and all the white-clad troopers actually stepped closer. "What are you doing here?"

"Believe it or not, I'm here to rescue you."

"You're a little late," she said. She looked at the dark-haired man in the black armor. "Force-blessed, I know this man. He was a part of my father's personal entourage before he transferred for career purposes."

"Do you trust him?"

Anabel looked back to Bel. "I had a huge crush on him, to be honest. He always looked so dashing, and was so nice to me." She swayed, and Bel could tell she was on her last legs.

"Take your helmets off, all of you," the Force-blessed man said.

Bel nodded to his men, and they took their helmets off to reveal men and women with the scars of hard-won experience. He stepped closer to Bel. "What are your orders?"

"To infiltrate this facility and rescue Anabel and any other religious prisoners at all costs."

"How were you planning on getting them off planet?"

"Sir…" one of the sergeants said, but Bel silenced him.

He recognized now who he was speaking to. "The frigate _Desolate_ was ordered to transport the last legion of Grand Moff Dinteri's troops off the planet. The Grand Moff is under investigation for Anabel's actions, his other daughter is under cabin arrest. There's a very good chance Diktat Hubrin will have him killed. We were going to put her and any others we could find in armor, and just march into the _Desolate_."

One of the seeming Imperial troopers said, "That's actually better than our plan."

Tobin S'Artin gave a wry smile. "It is, isn't it? Hershied has spoken very highly of Dinteri. Assuming his family is safe, what are his intentions?"

"He and his oversector command staff are…considering asking to join you, Tobin S'Artin."

Anabel's left knee buckled. Before her escort could, Bel rushed forward and slid down on his knees to catch her before she hit the ground.

"Fine," Tobin said as he surveyed the touching scene. "When the Force providers, only a fool refuses. Everyone to the transports, now!"


	41. The Battle of Bastion

Chapter Forty review responses are available in my forums. Thank you for reading!

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**Chapter Forty-One: The Battle of Bastion**

Dinteri touched his console and watched as a hologram of Shanda Hastile appeared. "Admiral, all essential and support personnel have been picked up from Corusca. On a personal note, I wish to extend my personal apologies regarding the passing of your daughter. The riots that destroyed the facility have finally been put down, but the loss of life was terrible. Arabel was very dear to us. I feel like she's in the same room with me. I'll miss her smiles."

It was all Dinteri could do not to show his smile of relief. Instead, he made himself envision his little girl dead. Just the thought of it was enough to make his eyes water. "I appreciate that, Shanda. When will you be back?"

"Two days."

"Very well. There is to be a full staff briefing when you return, and then…and then we will need to begin steps to coordinate my resignation."

Hastile managed to act shocked. "Resignation?"

"For the sake of the Empire, I must resign. My daughter was found guilty of treason. The perception alone is a stain on my honor, and so I will resign. We will discuss it further after you return."

"Yes, sir."

The connection ended and Dinteri reached up both hands and rubbed his face to hide the sweltering rise of emotions. His little girl was safe, but there was still no word from Valera. Her ship was simply gone.

Two days later, with the _Desolute_ in orbit, Dinteri attended his very last formal briefing as a grand moff of the Empire.

The briefing was being made by a Bothan admiral who was so deeply in the Security Directorate's folds that the joke was even his underclothes were Directorate black.

"We estimate S'Artin's forces to be approaching fifty nine capital ships," Admiral Dik'shia said. The Bothan growled a little whenever he spoke the Pretender's name. "This is based in large part on our own defections. He may have more. We know he has a single super-laser enabled ship. The Emperor has authorized us to enhance the fleet with three super-laser bearing ships, unfortunately our naval stock lacks the size to handle the necessary components. We are preparing a salvage operation to Dubrillian in the hopes of obtaining two _Pelleaon_-class hulls to use as weapons platforms."

Shol Denteri pulled up information on Dubrillion on his holopad. The planet was one of hundreds of worlds ravaged during the Vong War. It was far enough out to the rim that the Empire made no effort to reclaim it, and instead just used it as a ship graveyard.

The realization struck like a thunderbolt, and it took everything he had for Shol not to laugh out loud. S'Artin was operating out of Dubrillion. That was why he was using such old capital ships. And yet, with the shrinking of the modern navy, the ships he used were still just as effective.

The salvage operation was going to be met with a nasty surprise, that much he knew.

"Kashyyyk is a complete loss," the Bothan continued. "The Emperor has accepted our recommendation to cease all activity there. The world's biosphere is failing and without a slave population there, operations do not make sense. There has also been increasing unrest in Corella. All the worlds in the system have seen riots, and there has been an increased level of defection among captains from that world."

_If only he knew_, Dinteri thought. Dik'shia was a hard line supporter of the Emperor's new policies, and had already gained a flag through his close association with Amorine Hubrin and the Security Directorate. He was speaking to grand moffs and grand admirals as if to children, with an arrogance beyond belief.

"Thank you, Admiral Dik'Shia," Taklon said from his seat across the room. "Does Director Hubrin have any recommendations for Corella?"

"We have increased the Directorate presence and initiated an award program for anyone who turns in a potential traitor. So far we have made two thousand arrests with a 100 percent conviction rate."

_Meaning two thousand innocent beings died_, Shol translated.

"Good news, I'm sure," Taklon said without an ounce of sarcasm audible in his voice. "Thank you for your briefing. Dismissed."

The many beings of the senior admiralty and moff college stood and made their way out of the room. Taklon looked hard at Shol, and with a start he realized it was the first time the two men had been near each other in days.

The old admiral made a subtle sign that was used to signal the beginning of an attack.

Shol felt his heart beat. He had, for security's sake, stayed completely out of the loop regarding not just his daughter's rescue, but also the evacuation of his family and the families of the other high ranking officers that might want to defect. And because of that distance, he only now realized the time had come.

"Dik'shia," Taklon called. The Bothan looked at the old Grand Admiral with a hint of suspicion. "I was wondering if you would like to join Shol and I for some caf? The cart in the commons is small, but the Muun there brews a mean double caf. It's time to start talking about what will happen to our sector after Shol retires."

"I…would be honored," the Bothan said, clearly surprised by the invitation.

"Excellent. Excellent. Well, let's to it, then. After a briefing I find myself in need of a bit of liquid stimulation!"

The three walked through the bustling academy, which now had more high-ranked officers than it did cadets. The separation of the moffs and admiralty from the Emperor was complete and thorough. By removing leaders like Dinteri and Chinlee from Corusca, Hubrin effectively removed any direct communication the Emperor had with his own military establishment.

They reached the common area, which was a wide grassy park between four of the largest central buildings of the Academy and made their way to the topcaf cart. A clumping of chairs and tables around the cart allowed for a leisurely break.

Shol nodded to one table, occupied by a young captain and his paramour. The captain saw Chinlee nod to him, blushed, and quickly stood. He took his friend's hand and the two drifted away, talking quietly, while the three flag officers ordered their drinks.

They settled around the newly vacated table. The sky overhead was dark cobalt, and the breeze was brisk and refreshing with the promise of encroaching winter. Bastion started as a military world, but after a few centuries of human terraforming and political importance, it had become quite beautiful in its own right. Shol realized with a start he was going to miss it.

"Well, I must say you're doing an excellent job, Dik'shia," Taklon began in his grandfatherly voice. "I'll admit I was not enthusiastic about the change over, but you and your people have made the transition as painless as possible. I commend you."

"Thank you," Dik'shia said. Bothan or not, it was biologically impossible for any sentient being not to preen under praise from Taklon Chinlee. The man could make a Hutt feel beautiful.

"It is a shame we're losing so many new recruits to the trials," Taklon continued. "It is too bad we cannot weed them out before spending time and resources on their training!"

"Precisely!" Dik'shia said, suddenly excited. "I have proposed to the Diktat a program of mental conditioning for all new recruits to ensure compliance with their superiors. A simple program of reinforced cerebral psyprop insertion and chem-stim rebalancing would have the recruits ready to be molded to whatever state we need them!"

Shol fought with all his being not to shudder at the thought. "I know from my history that conditioning such as that does not work on all species."

"True," Dik'shia admitted. "But it is effective on almost all humanoid species, which are our primary conscription targets. The Diktat very much liked the idea and has already forwarded it to the Emperor for his approval."

"Excellent," Taklon managed to say with a smile that had no hint of the disgust he too must have felt. Both men were of the opinion that free will and intellect made the best officers and soldiers. What Dik'shia was proposing was little better than fighting with biological droids after a complete memory wipe. All initiative was lost after such a program, not to mention the moral horror of destroying personalities to create soldiers.

"Grand Admiral, if I may, the Directorate made an inquiry this morning regarding your family. I hesitate to ask, but…"

"No, it's all right, Old Boy," Taklon said. "I'm well over ninety, you see, and I'm ashamed to admit that with my many marriages I've sown progeny across the galaxy. I've asked for clarification on just what family you wish to have here. I understand from a helpful Binn at the Directorate that family extends to myself, a spouse and up to two generations of direct descendents. I got that response yesterday. This morning, I sent the holocom to my children and grandchildren that they need to report to the nearest Naval station for transport here."

"That is good news," Dik'shia said with obvious relief. "I know that is difficult."

"Quite all right, old boy. It will be good to see them again. They're spread all over the galaxy. I haven't even seen some of my great grandchildren, or their children, for that matter."

"Good, good…"

And then Admiral Dik'shia's chest exploded.

"Quite all right, old boy," Taklon said, all trace of grandfatherly joviality gone. Shol rolled out of his chair in alarm, having no idea what the plan actually was. "Bloody Corellan hells!" he shouted.

Around them, pandemonium erupted as cadets and officers alike shouted in alarm.

A thin yellow beam of energy seared the air and struck down a colonel. Shol recognized the man as one of Dik'shia's main enforcers. Two more shots eliminated other known Directorate supporters. Throughout it all, Taklon sat and sipped his caf. "Much too old for all this running around," he said, raising his cup to the Bothan's body. "That young lieutenant is a good shot, isn't she?"

"That's the plan, then?"

"Oh, it's just getting started," Chilnee said cooly. On the edge of the campus, Shol could see black guards billowing into the commons, over two hundred easily. "It's a shame Hubrin isn't here anymore," the Grand Admiral continued. "Shall we?"

The two men walked away from the table where Admiral Dik'shia's body was slowly slipping out of his seat to the cold permacrete ground.

"Who's with us?" Dinteri asked, talking casually as if they were not just committing open insurrection against the Empire.

"Our people-Hastile, Boortins and Maric. Grand Moff Chal-tar has also joined us with nearly his entire over sector command group. Evidently one of his cubs resisted the Blackguard's attempts to capture them and was killed. Poor thing is beside himself with rage. I estimate we have a good seven hundred ships already in orbit that will join us, and many more in deployment that are coming, though it will take time for them to arrive. And Arabel appears to have a suitor."

Shol tripped. "What?"

"You remember that bright young trooper officer you found? Gaer?"

"Yes?"

"Hastile had him lead the strike force. Young Arabel fell right into his arms. And guess who they ran into while trying to rescue little Arabel?"

"Who?"

"S'Artin himself. It appears our new Emperor was leading a personal effort to rescue all the people who assisted him on Coruscant. Even at his best, do you think Antias would have ever done anything like that? They actually snuck out on board the _Desolate_. Hastile was able to plead our request to S'Artin and he's agreed to assist us. We just need to open the door. And in the meantime, Gaer has been sitting by Arabel's bed, holding her hand, since they left orbit."

Taklon's expression sobered. "Shanda said the girl was put through a full interrogation regimen. But she'll recover—that's the most important part."

Shol could not hide his tears. "I knew Gaer was looking at her too much."

"He's a good lad, Shol. And would you rather she marry a good, responsibility military lad, or some slacker uni student?"

"True. And the rest of my family?"

"A squad removed your watchers and picked your family up right as the sniper opened fire. It was coordinated, of course. And Shol—S'Artin had already saved Valera. Dila Hershied asked him to intercede when they intercepted the signals, and led the taskforce herself. Valera is fine."

"Thank the stars."

"No, my friend, thank the Force."

They walked on the far side of the commons, while the blackguards found themselves under the assault of a full battalion of men in civilian clothes, but who wore the powerpacks and blaster gauntlets of Imperial troopers. More blackguards were coming, and with them a hover assault vehicle.

"They went to the big guns sooner rather than later," Taklon noted.

"In all likelihood they've been planning for something like this," Dinteri said. "I rather got the impression I was just the first moff that would be forced out."

"Hubrin is quite sneaky. She's as cunning a civilian as any I've met."

"But she still thinks like a civilian."

"Indeed she does."

The 'civilian' rebels turned and fled the now division-strength showing of blackguards, loyal troopers and their heavy armament. Dinteri and Taklon entered their private speeder and were ten miles away when the blast of a turbolaser from orbit slammed into the commons area of the Naval Academy.

The shockwave of the explosion almost threw their car from the sky. Behind them in the mirror, Dinteri could see a thin mushroom cloud rising over what was once the school. "I hope we got everyone out in time," he said.

"No help for it now," Taklon said. He removed a data pad from his belt. "The _Iridescent_ is already under fire from loyalist ships. She was the ship that fired."

"Is she fully crewed?"

"Actually, her crew is on the weapon platform nearby. The ship is slaved to the _Desolute_."

"Good. Frintik is in command of the loyalist forces, right?"

"As of this morning."

They flew in silence across city toward the Naval space port sixty five kilometers north of the academy. Shol landed the car on the tarmac itself, where an executive shuttle waited with a squad of troopers and Admiral Shanda Hastile.

"Shol, Taklon," she said with a nervous smile. "I figure some informality is due, given present circumstances."

"I couldn't agree more, Old Girl," Taklon said. He wrapped the much, much younger woman in a hug, and kissed her square on the lips. He then leaned back and laughed. "Still have it!"

Hastile appeared caught between fear, humor and outrage. She decided to smile. "Not bad for an old man."

"There's a reason I have kids all over the galaxy!" the Grand Admiral said with a great guffaw. "Gods, it's good to be alive. I've not had this much fun in decades."

"Let's go," Shol said. They climbed aboard the shuttle. "Admiral, is my family aboard the _Desolate_?"

"Yes, sir," Hastile said, once more back to business. "They landed on board just as you were leaving the academy. We've un-covered at least twenty moles."

"Which means there are probably more than forty on the ship," he said.

"At least," Hastile agreed.

They were already high up, but still they could see a second mushroom cloud rise over the capital city. "Looks like they hit the Directorate and the communications tower," Shol noted.

"Excellent," Taklon said. They broke orbit just as the _Iridescent_, one of the older frigates on active duty, exploded in a brilliant flash of white. "I'm surprised it got the second shot off," Taklon said. "Most slave systems fail under that type of bombardment."

"I have very good slicers," Hastile said.

They boarded the frigate _Desolate_, where the Mon Cal captain was waiting for them. "Moff Dinteri," he said earnestly, "the entire crew is with you, sir."

"The entire crew?"

"Well," Captain Terpfen said with a shrug and a smile, "those alive. We found another eight moles, so we're almost thirty staff short, but we'll make due."

"How many loyalist ships do we face?"

"Four hundred," Captain Terpfen said. "We have them outnumbered, and we control this quadrant's weapon platform."

"Thank you all," Dinteri said earnestly.

"Indeed," Chinlee said. "My friends, it is time. Prepare for battle. Captain, send the signal to our friends."

"Channel is open."

Taklon stepped onto the holopad. "This is Grand Admiral Taklon Chinlee to His Majesty, Emperor Tobin Solo Fel Artin."

A holographic image appeared opposite Taklon. "Admiral. I am intercepting some interesting com traffic."

"Indeed. On behalf of the senior most members of the Moff College and Admiralty, I hereby request asylum with your forces."

"Grand Admiral, on behalf of all the free peoples of the galaxy, I grant your request. Form up and be prepared to run a gauntlet."

"Yes, Majesty."

The signal ended just as the first turbolaser blast splashed against their shields. "I see Frintik monitored the call," Taklon said.

The Mon Calamari captain and Admiral Hastile each rushed to their own stations as around them, space lit up as hundreds of ships started firing on each other.

"Shore up the line," Taklon snapped, every inch the grand admiral now. "All defecting ships fall into diamond formation. Fire on any target of opportunity. Platform 23, why are you not firing?"

A garbled voice rose from the communication pit. "Moles sabotaged us, sir. We've managed to knock the platform out of commission, but we can't help."

"Good enough, son. Get your people on their shuttles and report back to your ships."

"Yes, sir!"

Dinteri sighed. Already they had their first major glitch; he doubted it would be their last. The best strategies were good only until the first shots were fired. He grasped a rail as the whole ship bucked under a heavy barrage. He could see and hear the visceral _thumps_ of the heavy turbolaser canons as the _Desolate_ returned fire on the nearest loyalist ship.

Suddenly the sky darkened as a bulbous monstrosity dropped out of hyperspace only a few thousand klicks away from the battle. Almost as soon as it reverted from hyperspace, the massive ship unleashed a thick beam of green destruction that slammed into the loyalist frigate firing on the _Desolate_. The ship exploded as it split in half. The aft section began tumbling down into a lower orbit while the fore of the ship went shooting like a missile into the space between two other firing ships.

Moments after the first huge ship appeared, other historical hulks joined it, one after the other. _Scythe_-class and _Pelleaon_-class dreadnaughts flew into the center of the battle, unleashing torrents of turbolaser and missile fire that filled the sky. Modern imperial frigates and corvettes arrived as well, until nearly fifty additional ships had joined the fight.

The loyalist ships attempted to reform their line, but every time they did Tobin's superlaser blew a hole in the formation.

"Old Boy," Taklon said, "I don't think we're going to have to escape Bastion."

Dinteri heard the door open from the executive quarters and saw Elena drift out. She was dressed sensibly in grey slacks and a teal blouse centered with a wide black belt. Her appearance was like that of a flower in the middle of a munitions plant as she moved to stand beside him.

"Captain Terfpen," the tactical station called, "we are receiving orders from a ship identifying itself as the _Miraluka_ ordering us to bring our fleet around to cut off retreat."

"Comply, Captain," Dinteri said. "There is no halfway. We're either with him, or against him."

"You know, we could attack now and claim it was a trap we set for him," Taklon pointed out.

"We could," Dinteri agreed.

"But you won't," Shol's wife said. "Because once you give your word, you keep it."

"I gave my word to the Emperor as well."

Elena Dinteri smiled grimly. "Loyalty must be earned. As far as I am concerned, the Emperor betrayed our trust when he issued a warrant for our little girl's life."

Dinteri looked at Taklon, who shrugged. "I just like playing the Sith's Advocate," the old admiral said.

"Captain, send word through all of our people to comply with the new Emperor's orders," Shol said.

"Confirmed."

Dinteri, his wife and friends watched as the scene of the raging battle shifted as Terfpen brought the _Desolute_ around the burned out hulks of several lost ships. They saw one of their own corvettes crack in half as its reactors went, but continued on until they came around and saw the almost a hundred loyalist ships trying to escape the rebel onslaught.

As soon as Dinteri's squadron was in position, the combined power of the defecting and rebel fleet unleashed a massive barrage of concussion missiles and proton torpedoes. "My friends," Taklon said, "I do not believe it is our new Emperor's intent to help us evacuate. I believe he intends to take Bastion."

Dinteri nodded. "I believe you're right, my friend. Admiral Hastile, spread the word to all ships. We are to open fire until the loyalist ships surrender or are destroyed."

"Other weapons platforms are coming around the horizon," Havrick reported.

"Their superlaser is moving too," Taklon pointed out. The Grand Admiral had moved to a tactical station on the executive deck. Shol and Elena joined him, while Admiral Hastile stayed with the captain.

The tactical review was fed by data from military satellites around the planet and provided instantaneous views of Bastion's defense. The ten weapons platforms were all moving, preparing to bring their considerable armaments into the battle.

The moment the first platform cleared the planetary horizon enough to have a line of sight to fire, S'Artin's superlaser took it out. The huge ship had already left the battle and was on a collision course with the next platform. Meanwhile, the loyalist fleet was being pounded to pieces with deadly effectiveness. The space between the capital ships was alive with fighter and bomber combat.

On the tactical, another platform flared into so much atomized dust.

The last loyalist ship cracked in half and flamed out. Between the defecting ships and S'Artins' forces, they had almost six hundred capital ships in orbit. They had lost some ships, but Dinteri knew that was inevitable.

Another platform exploded, having never made a single shot.

Suddenly the display blinked and was replaced by the hologram of S'Artin himself. "Attention, people of Bastion. I am Tobin Solo Fel Artin, by right of birth and law, Emperor of the Galaxy. I have taken control of this planet. All forces in orbit are loyal to me, or destroyed. In order to facilitate a peaceful transition, I ask that all citizens stay in their homes. It is my intent that basic daily services will continue uninterrupted, and that your lives continue with as little disruption as possible. However, you must understand that this is a military conquest. If you oppose me, I will kill you. If you oppose me in numbers, I will fire on your location from orbit if necessary. For the sake of the future, I will do what I must to secure the birthplace of the New Empire. Stay in your homes and monitor the holonet for further instructions. Thank you."

"And there it is," Chinlee said. He suddenly laughed. "I only wish I could see Hubrin's face when she learns what her treachery has earned—the loss of Bastion itself!"


	42. The Spark That Started the Fire

Chapter 41 Review Responses are available in my forums here on ff dot net.

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**Chapter Forty-Two: The Spark That Started The Fire**

The shuttle took Dinteri, accompanied by Taklon, to the large docking back of the _Scythe_-class heavy cruiser, which was a good two hundred meters longer than the longest frigates in current naval service. The shuttle docked in a spacious bay and through the viewport Dinteri saw the new Emperor himself with a line of troopers in gleaming white armor but red pauldrons to mark them apart from old Imperial troopers. The Emperor wore black with a gold circlet around his head.

Dinteri led the way down the ramp. He never spoke to S'Artin directly during the young man's imprisonment on Corusca, but he recognized him instantly. It was the rest of the waiting party that surprised him.

Dila Hershied stood just behind and to the left of the new Emperor, while on his right stood Princess Mariha Fel herself. Dinteri stopped ten paces from them, and bowed deeply from the waist. He followed protocol to the letter in how a grand moff was supposed to greet a sitting emperor.

S'Artin nodded regally. "Welcome, Grand Moff Dinteri," he said. "And Grand Admiral Chinlee. I've heard much about the two of you."

"I deny everything," Taklon said with a blank face.

"I knew she had to be lying," S'Artin said with the same expression.

Taklon's sabbacc face cracked with the hint of a smile. Tobin continued. "I believe you gentleman know my companion, her Imperial Highness Princess Mariha."

"I believe we've met a time or two," Chinlee said, ever the old gentleman. "It's good to see you well, lass."

"It's good to be well," she said, fighting to repress her own smile.

"And of course, Grand Moff Hershied."

"Grand Moff?" Dinteri asked with a raised brow.

"We follow Imperial protocol for the sake of ease with our new recruits," S'Artin explained. "Please walk with me."

They followed as he led them from the bay into a spacious conference room. The room was equipped with not just drinks, but strong drinks. "I thought after a day like this you might need a drink," Tobin said.

"With your permission, I shan't refuse," Taklon said as he made quick time to the Corellan whiskey.

"You have Bastion," Dinteri said. "What next?"

"That depends on if I can keep Bastion," S'Artin admitted. "Right now, my Cousin Antias can field many more ships than I can hope to. However, with you and the Grand Admiral's defection, it is my hope others will follow, and large scale civil war will not be necessary. I took Bastion as a rallying point. Defectors are getting caught because, frankly, they don't know how to find me."

"That's why you've taken the title of Emperor," Dinteri said. "You don't wish to eliminate the Empire, you wish to lead it."

"Why fix what is not broken? It was worked relatively well for the past four hundred years," Tobin said. "Save for one major flaw."

"The murder of children," Mariha said.

"Are you truly ab…Force strong, dear?" Dinteri asked the princess.

"I am," she said. She looked at the bar and a bottle of brandy lifted from the surface and floated to the table. Dinteri watched with a stunned expression. "I just learned to do that," the princess admitted with a happy flush.

"She recently had something of a breakthrough," Tobin said. "I have three other younger apprentices, but I know there are many more."

"You plan to bring the Jedi back?" Shol asked.

"No. I plan to bring the Imperial Knights back."

"The Imperial Knights?" Taklon said, clearly fascinated. "You mean the Grey Jedi?"

"I have training as both Jedi and Sith," Tobin said. "I carry a balance between light and dark. Only by balancing the two can the galaxy be at peace. The Jedi and Sith wars in the past tore the galaxy apart too many times. I will not let that happen again. Plus, just having midi-chlorians does not mean a child necessarily has to be trained. The Empress Mother's own mother did not train in the Force until she was well into middle age, and did not become a Jedi proper until her own children were grown. Regardless, we must stop the slaughter of the children. We must bring true balance to the Empire. And you are going to help me."

"What do you require?" Dinteri said.

"First, to get Bastion under control. Even before my own organization grew, I knew who you were. You're considered an honest man and respected by both civilians and military leaders alike. I am going to appoint you as my governor for Bastion. Bring it under control. Allow the loyalists to leave in peace; kill them if they choose to fight. The Emperor is sure to counter-attack. Plan a defense. I believe we will only need to defend this planet once. After that, we will not be acting in defense."

Dinteri nodded as he absorbed the order, and then looked at Mariha. "I hope you can forgive my presumptuousness, but for the affection I've always borne for you, I have to ask you, Princess. Are you happy?"

"Happy is overrated," she said. "But I am sure that I've made the right choice."

"The answer of a wise, intelligent woman," Taklon said. He sipped his whiskey.

S'Artin nodded. "Very well. Please return to your ship. Since Bastion is likely to take fire, you can move your family either back to the surface, or to a safe world within my territory."

"I would prefer they be safe, Majesty."

"Then they will be."

The door opened behind Dinteri. He stood and sighed with relief. His elder daughter stood there, still in her Medical Internist Cadet uniform. "Valera!" he said.

She rushed to his arms, and he hugged her tight. Tobin stepped past him. "Loyalty is earned," he told the Grand Moff in a strange echo of his wife. "You have given me your word, and now I keep mine. Take her back to your ship to be with your family, and when you're ready I'll have a pilot fly them to any world of your choosing, or a safe world within my control."

"Thank you, Majesty," Shol said, even as he kissed the top of his eldest daughter's head.

~~Last Jedi~~

~~Last Jedi~~

Emperor Antius Huun Fel III raged as he threw the Antinin Crystal goblet into the wall of his private briefing room. "Damn it all!"

Diktat Amorine Hubrin stood with an unreadable face, while her senior-most analyst paled. The Emperor had jumped from his seat at the news of Bastion's loss and began cursing like a third year cadet.

"That will be all, Colonel," Hubrin said.

The analysts, relieved, turned and fled the room. Amorine waited until she was alone before she stood and walked to the Emperor and placed a gentle hand on his shoulder. "Antias, it is not as bad as you think."

He spun, his face flushed with rage. "Not as bad? I just lost the cradle of the Empire to a pretender to my throne!"

"You did not lose Bastion, Antias. You gained a target. For the first time, we have a viable target that S'Artin is going to defend." She ran a hand along the side of his face and smiled softly. The Emperor's eyes closed and his angry flush eased at her touch. "A decisive victory will sway those considering defecting. The loss is temporary, my love. And the victory you will gain will forever cement your hold over the throne."

She leaned forward and brushed her lips to his, and he responded with aggressiveness bordering on violence. Amorine accepted it with a happy laugh as he all but threw her down on the briefing table.

Ninety two levels above, Empress Satchana Fel closed her eyes and fought back her tears as she flicked off the surveillance holo her own staff had installed. She was Satchana of Kuat before becoming Empress. Though young and chosen for her kind and gentle temperament, Satchana was no fool. She knew if she did not bear a child, then she would be divorced like the others before her. It was political.

But the Emperor had not come to her bed at all since Mariah fled. She would have welcomed him—Antias was a handsome, powerful man. While their marriage was not based on love, she still felt great affection for him, and during their first year of marriage he seemed to feel the same. But this… She knew the Diktat was using her husband to gain power, and it frustrated her endlessly to know how well it was working. It felt as if the man she had married was gone, replaced by a simpering slave to another woman's sex.

"Falé?"

Her senior-most lady in waiting appeared instantly. "Mistress, how may I serve?"

"Please have the family yacht prepared. I wish to take a sabbatical at my father's estate."

"I'll see to it at once, Majesty. I'm sure Kuat of Kuat will be pleased to have his daughter return."

"I hope so, Falé."

~~Last Jedi~~

~~Last Jedi~~

Hershied ran through the hall of the Bastian City administrative center, which Tobin had claimed as his command center on the planet. The fires from the initial protests and riots were quelled. Most civilians stayed in their homes, but Antias Fel had a definite following and riots erupted. Some Dinteri managed to dissolve by the promise of safe passage for any who wanted to leave. A few, however, were spearheaded by Blackguards. Those the new planetary governor put down with brute force.

Dinteri had no choice. He did not have sufficient men to hold the planet if the whole population rose up—at that point they would have to depend on a planetary bombardment that would leave the planet it ruins and negate the point of taking it in the first place.

Every day, Tobin or Mariha appeared on the local holo feeds asking for calm. After a four-hour long, very tense meeting with the planetary civil leaders, residential services started again. Once the riots ended, a few people emerged from their homes to cautiously attempt to continue their lives. Tobin even allowed local law enforcement to resume their roles, provided they adhered to martial law and obeyed Naval orders. His overtures appeared to have settled into a tense peace.

It was on the tenth day of the occupation that Hershied ran from the shuttle pad like a woman of twenty rather than one fast approaching fifty. She burst through the security lines and made her way to the top floor where the new Emperor was again meeting with Dinteri and the civil authorities, in this case the city magistrate.

She walked past the troops on station and into the meeting. "I'm sorry to interrupt," she lied as she walked in, "but you need to see this, Majesty."

Tobin raised one brow but said nothing as Dila slapped the inset table console and the wall across from them shimmered with a holofeed. "It's broadcasting on all news networks," she explained.

"…promised swift retribution. To repeat, the entire Corellan System, which includes the worlds of Corella, Drall, Talus, Tralus, Selonia, Crollia and Soronia, and represents the most populous single system in the galaxy, has declared its allegiance to the Pretender, Tobin Solo Fel Artin. A fleet of frigates under the Corellan flag attacked and destroyed the Imperial garrison on Corella. Members of the Imperial Security Directorate were publicly executed. In the wake of this astounding announcement, Mon Calamari has also declared its allegiance to the Pretender. The Emperor has promised swift retribution and…."

The speaker was a young, attractive Arkanian with thick blonde hair and brilliant, glittering blue eyes. She stopped speaking as the feed switched to another view. "We are receiving a new report from Kuat Sector, where Kuat of Kuat has set up a holonews conference. We are switching there now."

The door to their conference room opened and this time it was Princess Mariha who entered. "Tobin, are you watching this?"

"I am," Tobin said quietly.

Mariha moved around to sit behind him, while the magistrate blushed. "I feel as if I should leave…Majesty."

Tobin looked hard at the man. "No, you should stay, Magistrate Haskin. This is the future you are seeing."

"I serve the Emperor."

"You serve the Empire," Dinteri corrected.

Kuat of Kuat was a tall, thin man with thinning blond hair and a slightly oversized chin. He wore the elaborate robes of Kuat nobility as he stalked into the room. "I am Kuat of Kuat," he began in the stilted, formulaic fashion of his world. "First son of Kuat, descendent pure of the First Kuat. I serve the Empire, as my family has done so for untold centuries. And I say to you now that the Empire has been betrayed. The Emperor has fallen prey to dark seduction and has committed adultery against his wife, my daughter, Satchana of Kuat. For this outrage, I declare the marriage null and void. I declare Antias Fel a non-person to the hordes of Kuat. I declare him to be the Pretender. From this day on, Kuat of Kuat declares Tobin Solo Fel Artin of Bastion to be rightful Emperor, and to him we pledge the full weight of our drive yards."

Tobin fought hard to breathe evenly, and did not even hesitate when he felt Mariha take his hand. "Tobin, do you realize what this means?" she said.

"The civil war has just got bigger," Dinteri said.

Tobin nodded. "Dila, I don't care how, but we need to establish lines of communication with Corella, Kuat and Mon Calamari. Kuat is the most heavily defended world aside from Corusca, but Mon Calamari and Corella are susceptible to attack. Magistrate, you need to start emergency preparation. When the attack comes, we need to evacuate as much of the civilian population to the shelters as possible."

The magistrate, pale and frightened, merely nodded before he stood and left. Dinteri stood as well. "I need to return to my duties as well, Majesty."

"Of course, Shol. Thank you."

He and Hershied left and closed the door behind him. Tobin stared at the now muted holofeed. Only after a moment did he realize he was still holding Mariha's hand. He turned in his seat until he saw her looking at him, her head tilted to one side.

"For a man who needs to take me as a wife, you've taken an interesting approach to courting me."

"You're my apprentice first," Tobin said in a suddenly dry throat.

"An apprentice is not going to help you, Tobin. But an Empress might."

Tobin suddenly shot to his feet and walked to the wide, ten-foot windows that looked out over the world of Bastion. A moment later she stood beside him, close but not touching. "When I first saw you in that cage of Hershied's," she said, "I was expecting to see a savage criminal. Instead, I saw you. I felt as if I should know you—you felt familiar to me somehow, as if in a dream. I have seen you kill hundreds of thousands without blinking an eye, and weep over a single lost child. I don't understand you. Why don't you have lovers? The women around you would throw themselves at you without hesitation. Hell, I think even Dila would love you if you let her."

"She does like young men," Tobin admitted with just the hint of a smile.

"So why are you alone? Why am I only your apprentice when we both know I must be more than that? Is it because of her? Because of Klinti?"

Tobin turned to her, his jaw clenching and his brows furrowed with anger, but she did not back away. She simply stared at him with a curious, wrenching expression. "Can you tell me about her?"

"Why?"

"Because I want to know her. You loved her so much, I can see it. I want to know her, and maybe it will help me know you as well."

"It…"

"It's been long enough, Tobin." She reached down and took his hand, and he did not resist. "Do you think she would want you to be this lonely?"

"She saw this," he finally said. "She was Miraluka, the very last of her kind. She had no eyes, but saw with the Force. And her vision was so clear. She saw you in my future. She would have been my concubine, or so I thought. A political marriage to you, but a marriage of love with her. But she knew, even then. I didn't realize it that night when I chose my path. She wept and held me, and I thought it was because she knew I could not marry her. But now I realize it was because she knew my path condemned her to…."

His words caught in his throat as the old pain welled up anew. "I killed her," he finally said. "In my hubris and arrogance, I killed her. She asked me not to let go, but I did. I let them take her so they could treat her burns. Instead, they saw she was an Abnormal and they killed her. I let her go…"

He could not cry. That was the worst part of all—Darth Valus and the Sith stole from him the ability to cry. So he stood radiating pain in silence. Somehow, Mariha sensed that pain and placed an arm around his shoulder, holding him with the same silent intensity he felt. It was not rage or despair, but simple grieving. It rent his heart, and yet it felt as if a great, terrible weight had been lifted off his shoulders.

"I loved her so very much, but I let her go," he finally said.

"And so the unstoppable Jedi is human after all," Mariha breathed. Her own eyes were moist as she held him.

His breathing stilled as he let the Force sooth his swirling emotions. "There is no right or wrong. Those are childish, abstract conceptions to make us feel better. There is simply action and reaction. Choice and consequence. I made a choice at the prodding of the Force, and she died as a consequence. The price of the new Empire was her life. And I honestly cannot tell you if it was worth it."

Mariah then did something she had never done before. She gently pulled his face to hers and kissed him. It was her very first kiss, being the sheltered only daughter of the Emperor. It was innocent in its way, just a simple meeting of lips. But when they parted, he was staring at her with something approaching awe.

"I made a choice too," she said. "I chose to take the midi-chlorian test and accept the consequences. And when you came for me, offering me a different future, I made another choice. And this, Tobin, is the consequence. Things are spiraling fast, and if we do not seize the initiative you will fail. You need me as your Empress. Between us, your claim to the throne will be uncontestable. The ceremony must be public, and it must be lavish. And if Satchana has gone home, then Kuat may be the best place to do it. But it must happen soon."

"I know you're right," he said. "I wouldn't have come if I didn't, but…"

She silenced him with another kiss. "When Klinti wept, Tobin, did she try to stop you?"

"No."

"Then maybe, just maybe, it is because she thought her life was worth a future where our kind can live free. That's what I thought when I took that test."

Tobin stared at her, and realized almost with a gestalt shift of his entire perception that Mariah was beautiful. Stunningly, breathtakingly beautiful. He ran a hand through her red tresses, luxuriating in the silky feel of it. "The defense of Bastion must come first. After that… will you accept my hand in marriage, my Princess?"

"I will, my Emperor."

~~Last Jedi~~

~~Last Jedi~~

"That's a lot of ships," Taklon said dryly. He and Dinteri stood on the bridge of the _Desolate_ in orbit around Bastion. One week was not enough to get all the defense platforms operating again, especially the majority which Tobin completely destroyed, but they did have two functioning platforms.

"Seven thousand," Dinteri confirmed. "Two oversector fleets. With the latest group of defectors, we have twelve hundred."

"Likely going to be a quick fight," Taklon said. "Your family is safe?"

"Yes. His Majesty has a newly colonized world under his control. They are there. Yours?"

"Hiding for now. Just in case. We're not going to be able to stop them from landing troops."

"I know. We've actually evacuated all ground forces from the surface at the moment and all civilians have been relocated to the shelters. We're as ready as we can be."

The holorelay flickered and Tobin appeared to address the fleet. "My friends, a moment of truth is upon us. The fleet assembled against us represents the largest gathering of Imperial ships in the history of the Reborn Empire. They are here because the Pretender knows his time is approaching. Victory this day will not win the war, nor will a loss lose the war. We are here to show our resolve and to make the Pretender realize it is time for him to step down. But know this—I will not throw any lives away needlessly. When the time comes, be prepared to retreat. You are more important to me than any amount of dirt, no matter where it is. The future is not the dirt below us, but people around you. Be brave, be strong, and know the future is upon us."

The image flickered away. "I'll give him this," Taklon said, "he's more personable than Antias is."

"Imperial ships are closing into firing range!" Admiral Hastile called.

"Here we go," Taklon said.

~~Last Jedi~~

~~Last Jedi~~

On board the Imperial frigate _Subjugator_, Subdiktat Arias Fulgorn straightened his tunic as the fleet admiral rattled off the statistics. The fight was so completely one-sided that the highest Security Directorate official under Amorine Hubrin herself was absolutely sure none of the enemy would survive.

"Admiral, it is time. Attack."

The Admiral, a bald, thick-set human from Sullust, nodded and echoed the order. Fulgorn turned his attention to the tactical display as the first elements of the fleet began to move forward. His smile of anticipation weakened, though, when he saw large pockets of ships were not moving. "Admiral, why is the fleet not attacking together?"

The admiral turned to the display, frowning heavily, when a pale, sweating captain ran to his side and began speaking urgently in a whisper Fulgorn could not make out. A moment later, the ship's alarm began blaring. "Admiral, what is happening?" Fulgorn demanded.

"The conscripts are mutinying against us!" the Admiral said. "And not just on this ship, but ships across the fleet."

"Kill them!"

"You don't understand, Subdiktat. There are ships where almost ninety percent of the crew are conscripts. If we kill them all, there will be no one left to run the ships!"

"Nonsense!" Fulgorn, who never served in any military capacity outside of the Directorate, shouted. "Order the ship marines to shoot any traitor or insurrectionist on sight!"

"That will be difficult, sir, since many of the marines are also conscripts!" the admiral said with less decorum than previously. "Captain, light the trouble ships up!"

Over a thousand ships lit up red on the display, with more popping up every minute. "That still leaves more than enough!" Fulgorn said. "Go forward with the attack, Admiral."

"We cannot attack with potential enemy ships at our back!"

Fulgorn pulled his side arm and pointed it at the Admiral. "We have your family, you fool. Do as I say, or you and your family will suffer."

The admiral stiffened, not with fear, but anger. "Very well, Subdiktat. Captain, signal all loyal ships to attack."

The tactical display accordingly showed over five thousand ships surge toward the defense line around Bastion. The lit up ships on the tactical hologram did not move, caught as they were in the middle of mutinies.

"Admiral, we're detecting mines," the captain said.

"Send out the missile boats," the admiral said. "All fighters launch. Clear the field for battle. We…what the blazes was that?"

On the periphery of their command deck window, he saw a billow of flame. "Sir!" the captain said, even more pale now. "The rear elements of the fleet are firing on us! Two ships have already been destroyed."

Fighting his rage, the admiral turned to a confused-looking Fulgorn. "And that, Subdiktat, is why only a fool charges into an attack with a possible enemy at his back."

Fulgorn did not hesitate to lift the side-arm he still had on his hand, and shoot the admiral between the eyes. "He obviously does not serve the Empire with enthusiasm," Fulgorn said. "Captain, we still have five thousand ships. Even with the traitors, the enemy has not even half that number. Split the fleet accordingly. We will destroy all who oppose the Empire."

The captain, staring with wide eyes at the dead admiral, turned to obey when the shield doors to the command deck exploded inward. With a howl, a mix of enlisted men and ship marines stormed the bridge. The bridge crew, without sufficient arms, did not bother to resist. The automated defense systems activated, but were immediately shut down by one of the enlisted crew. The captain, realizing they were betrayed, removed his own firearm but was shot dead before he could do anything.

Fulgorn spun and raised his weapon to fire, but the oncoming horde was so fast he had time for only one wild shot that missed its mark before the butt of a blaster rifle struck his face. The subdiktat dropped like a rock, blinking as blood flowed from his broken nose. He found a young man standing over him with a blaster rifle pointed at his head.

"You bastards conscripted my little sister of the streets like a criminal," the young man snarled, "and then you shot her in the head for being a traitor when she wasn't. This is for her."

Fulgorn was conscious of a bright flash of green and a roar of sound, and then nothing else.

~~Last Jedi~~

~~Last Jedi~~

"We've lost the _Dulgard_ and _Astral Dance_," Silmari said aboard the _Sword of Stars_. "The enemy is only attacking with a portion of their fleet. Perhaps they are holding back to prevent escape?"

On board the _Miraluka_, Tobin watched an enemy frigate bloom in its death throes, but not from any of his ships. "I don't think so, Silmari. Shol, are you seeing this?"

"We are," Dinteri responded. "We're picking up heavy com chatter. Almost a third of their fleet are experiencing mutinies from conscripted crewmen. Their fighters are going in circles as if they don't know who to attack."

"Stars, what a mess," Mariha said.

"A mess in our favor," Tobin said, sighing with relief. "Captain Deastri, put me on an open channel."

Deastri, having gone from piloting Wookiee slave transports to a ship of war, gave a curt nod as her people opened the channel. "You're live!"

"This is Emperor Tobin Solo Fel Artin to all ships in orbit around Bastion. Those of you who wish to serve the new Empire, where freedom and individual rights still matter, respond on this channel!"

Voices immediately started yammering their support, and Deastri's communications specialists quickly began to light up the friendly ships. "This is risky," Mariha said. "The loyalists are lighting them up too."

"We have a surprise in store for them, though," Tobin said. He lifted a personal comlink rather than the ship's communication. "Ashala, have your people been monitoring the situation?"

"We have."

"What is your decision then?"

"Emperor Artin, you words are being broadcast to all my people. Do we have your word that the restrictions placed upon my people preventing us from self defense and common travel will be lifted?"

Mariha was staring at Tobin in confusion, but he grinned at her. "Ashala and all the people of the Sekotan Vong, the days of your freedom are long overdue. You have paid many hundred fold for the crimes of your ancestors; you have paid enough. Upon my ascension to the throne, I will invite your leaders to Corusca to discuss the permanent elimination of all travel restrictions and the revocation of planetary defense restrictions. You have my word."

"Then your majesty, the Sekotan Vong hereby declare for you. Stand by."

"Tobin…" Mariha whispered, stunned and even a little frightened.

The space around the theater of battle shimmered as easily four thousand massive hulks emerged from hyperspace, bristling with armaments. Fifty thousand _yaret-kor_ plasma cannons fired at once.

"All ships, select a non-painted target and open fire," Tobin said to his own fleet.

The mutineers, Tobin's fleet and the Sekotan Vong fleet opened fire with devastating effect. The loyalist ships, already confused by the loss of their senior commander, looked for targets with little effect. It was the single most lop-sided victory the military scholars in the fleet could think of.

"Tobin," Mariha whispered softly as they watched the loyalist ships die, "the Vong cannot be trusted!"

"That's what the Empire said about Wookiees," Tobin said softly. "The Vong remade one of my worlds into a paradise in a matter of weeks. All worlds have a right to self defense so long as no offensive capabilities are built. I'm simply going to extend the same to the Vong."

"They have a fleet!"

"Which I requested they build under Imperial Charter," Tobin said. "Hundreds of years ago, they attacked us as enemies from outside the Force, Mariha. But since they found Zonama Sekot, they have been rejoined with the Force and made a part of this galaxy. They are not the Yuuzhan Vong. They have not been for centuries. If we wish to have freedom, we must have it for all of the Force's children."

Though Tobin was not aware of it, Deastri on her own volition kept the com line open. The entire fleet, the entire galaxy, heard Tobin's reasoning.

On board the lead _uro-ik v'alh_ ship, Ashala Dezcarti, the Master Shaper and Supreme Leader as chosen by Zonama Sekot itself, smiled. "Indeed we are children of the Force, Your Majesty," she said softly to herself. She looked through the vilip and watched as her children helped make quick work of the loyalists. It felt to Ashala as if she were looking at the future itself born from the pain and death of the past.

It was a good day.

* * *

Author's Note: This was a longer than average chapter, which means next week's chapter will be a little shorter. Four more chapters to go.


	43. The Wedding of the Century

This is a relatively short chapter, but important. As always, responses to last chapter reviews are available in my forums here on ff dot net. Thank you.

* * *

**Chapter Forty-Two: The Wedding of the Century**

The wedding announcement sent shockwaves through the whole galaxy. On Corusca, the old Emperor stared at the holonet relay with a stunned expression, despite Diktat Hubrin's best attempts to distract him.

In Imperial strongholds across the galaxy, officers and enlisted personnel alike realized the implications. The supposed Pretender was marrying the only child of their Emperor. And from the Princess's brilliant smiles when she walked off the shuttle to hug the Emperor's now ex-wife, it did not appear she was being forced into anything. If anything, the broadcast meeting made the former Empress and Princess look like they were the closest of friends.

The wedding itself was an overwhelming, lavish affair. Despite Cosrusca's best efforts to block the transmission, even on supposedly loyal worlds the citizens still wanted to see what many were calling the wedding of the century. The princess was carried through the populous High Streets of Kuat borne on a palanquin carried by sons and grandsons of Kuat of Kuat himself as a sign of obeisance to the new Imperial Family.

Behind the princess walked Tobin Solo Fel Artin, flanked by more of the Kuat's family. His walking was equally symbolic, the holoshills covering the wedding explained. For the Emperor was traditionally considered not just the ruler of the people, but the ultimate servant of the people. By walking through the High Streets, clad in a luxurious black and purple robe and topped with a brilliant Aldure silver crown shimmering with fire gems, he was showing that he was not above the people, but one of them.

Every holoshill covering the event made note that both the new Emperor and his bride openly carried lightsabers.

"The Imperial Princess and Soon to be Empress has stated that she carries the lightsaber of her penultimate grandmother, the First Empress Mother Jaina Solo Fel. This reporter was especially shocked to learn that, despite centuries of Imperial propaganda to the contrary, the Empress Mother was herself a Jedi Master of old, and that many past members of the Imperial Family were Force-sensitive and trained as Imperial Knights themselves."

The reporter, a strikingly beautiful Corellan human star of the holonet, read the scripted passage with well-practiced wonder in her voice. For the brief time the holocams centered on the woman's attractive face, her expression was one of awe to match the wonder in her words. The message was clear—the old Emperor and his predecessors had lied about their own family. Given the recent shocks regarding the Princess Mariha's public declaration of being an Abnormal, this second bit of news shook even the staunchest Loyalists.

Support for Emperor Antias began to crumble faster because of that statement than all the fighting Tobin had done so far.

As the old Empire cracked and crumbled, Tobin Solo Fel Artin stepped to his betrothed's palanquin and helped her down. In past weddings, the Emperor waited at the alter as the bride came to present herself to him. However, that was because the Emperor formally outranked all. Tobin's meeting her and walking with her was a clear signal to all that the two were of the same rank, Imperial Princess and ascending Emperor.

"Remember to smile, Tobin," Mariha said a she accepted his hand.

"I am smiling."

"No, you're grimacing. It looks as if your face is going to crack. Imagine everyone is in their undergarments."

Tobin glanced to the crowd and had the misfortune of spotting a rather large Ithorian female.

"Okay, bad timing," the princess admitted with a sparkling laugh. "Imagine me in my undergarments."

Tobin's blush was itself a prize.

They walked up the many steps of the opulent palace of the Kuat family, where Kuat of Kuat was waiting for them in a magnificent white robe glittering in the afternoon sun with lines of diamonds hanging from his hair.

Tobin knelt down before Kuat not as Emperor, but as a man seeking the hand of a wife. Beside him, Mariha knelt down not as an Imperial Princess, but as a woman seeking the hand of a husband. Kuat spoke the ancient words not of the Kuati ceremony, but of the ancient Coruscanti ceremony, while the better part of an entire galaxy watched, enthralled. His final words were, "May the Force bless this Union!"

Tobin stood with his wife, and she smiled with the hint of shyness in her eyes, and the two kissed to the viscerally loud cheers of the Kuati people. Whispering into her ear, Tobin said, "The future begins now."

~~Last Jedi~~

~~Last Jedi~~

"Fletcher Dunstallin, for genetic abnormalities detrimental to the well-being of the Empire, you are hereby sentenced to death. This sentence is not carried out lightly, and to ensure no undo pain is felt, the method of execution will be lethal hypospray, to be carried out this day, by order of His Imperial Majesty, Emperor Antius Huun Fel III."

The Magistrate assigned to Andara, an ancient Core World, spoke with a bored voice. The child in question was five years old. The boy was shaking and kicking in terror as the troopers strapped him onto the euthanasia table. On the other side of the window, the boy's parents cried inconsolably. The only reason they were still upright was because of the troopers forcing them to stand and watch. Immediately after the euthanasia, the two were to be remanded to a prison barge for hiding the boy's midi-chlorian count from official records.

"Is the boy secure?" the magistrate asked.

One of the troopers snapped to attention. "Yes, Magistrate."

"Very well. Let's get this over, I have a holoball game at four."

"Yes, Magistrate."

The trooper walked to the wall with the kill switch, but before he could tap it, the whole facility shook with a massive explosion that knocked everyone to the floor. The sounds of the facility's alarms drowned out the boy's terrified cries. Moments later the sound of blaster-fire filled the air, causing the clouds of dust and debris to light up as if with lightning.

"What in the stars was that?" the Magistrate asked.

A moment later he had his answer as a horde of civilians rushed into the facility. They carried old, bulky blasters that were still more than sufficient to kill the four troopers that guarded the boy and his parents.

"What is the meaning of this?" the Magistrate demanded when the dust settled.

The leader of the intruders wore a large, silver circle bisected by a half-line on a chain that hung down to the center of her chest. "The time for killing Force-blessed children is over, Magistrate," the woman said with a grim, determined smile. "Release the boy."

Her followers did just that, and in seconds the little boy with the unacceptable midi-chlorian count ran to his parent's arms, where all three wept in relief.

The magistrate's nostrils flared with a mix of fear and outrage. "You will not get away with this!"

"Won't we?" The woman asked. "Strap him down."

Four of her larger followers grabbed the magistrate and lifted him bodily off the floor before slamming him brutally into the chair. He kicked and fought just as fervently as the little boy he was going to kill just moments before.

"You can't do this!" he screamed as he fought. "I am a Magistrate of his Majesty Emperor Antias Fel!"

The woman sneered with contempt. "Know this, you murdering pig. As of mid-day, the civil leaders of Andara have formally declared this world's allegiance to His Imperial Majesty, Tobin Solo Fel Artin. The Emperor has declared the killing of children to be nothing less than murder; and there is only one way to deal with the murderers of children, magistrate."

The magistrate sputtered and shouted curses even while weeping himself as men stronger than him strapped him to a table designed to hold children. The air took on the rancid stench of a voided bladder. The civilians wrinkled their nose in disgust, but did not stop until the magistrate was firmly secured to the execution chair.

"For crimes against humanity," the woman said, "I sentence you to death. Do it."

A follower hit the kill switch. The magistrate screamed in terror when he felt the first nozzle against his neck. Then his body went cold, but not entirely numb. The dosage was for children, and he was a large, large man. He tried to scream out that there wasn't enough painkiller, but there was just enough to lock his tongue and reduce him to nothing more than a horrified groan.

When the second nozzle pushed the lethal fluid into his veins, he felt every agonizing second of its burning as it raced through his veins and stopped his heart.

~~Last Jedi~~

~~Last Jedi~~

The riots on Corusca were the largest and most violent since the Vong Wars. Blackguards were called out by the battalions, and the black Directorate ships in orbit fired indiscriminately on the quadrants with the worst riots, killing hundreds of thousands and causing millions of credits' worth of damage with each shot.

In the palace, the Emperor sat on his throne staring out across an empty court, since most of the courtiers were hiding in their homes, or fleeing the world entirely. He held a large tumbler of Corellan whiskey in his hand, while in his other he held a holopad waiting for his authorization for increased conscription and something to do with Kamino. This despite the fact that conscripts were the reason he lost two whole Oversector fleets at Bastion. Two whole Oversector fleets—more lost ships than anytime since the last Sith War that saw the end of the Galactic Alliance.

Amorine Hubrin walked into the room in her black uniform, though he noticed absently she had added a purple sash. It was a not-so-subtle way to say she had the ear of the Emperor. "My Emperor," she breathed in a sultry voice, "have you signed the authorization?"

"Why bother? They'll just rebel again."

"Oh no, Majesty, no longer. We've started a new conditioning program that will ensure their loyalty. We've already used it with our latest batch of black guards, and they've performed perfectly."

"Fine," he said absently. He gave his authorization to the holopad. "Where is Shol Dinteri? I want to ask him what happened on Bastion."

Hubrin smiled, leaned forward and kissed him with brazen ease. "Don't worry about Shol, my love. He has betrayed us, but he will be made to pay for his treason. He and all those who dare defy you."

The Emperor blinked. "He betrayed us? But, he's been my friend for years."

"S'Artin seduced him to the enemy camp," she said. "He made his choice and we will make him regret it to his last day."

The Emperor shook his head. "This can't be. Shol was one of my most loyal officers. What are you doing, Amorine? What are you doing to my empire?"

She leaned forward and stared him in the eye. "I am shaping it into what it was always meant to be," she said.

Her eyes seemed to bore into Antias' head, going deeper and deeper, until she was the only thing that mattered. When she said, "We will make the Empire great again, my love. Just you and I," her voice echoed in his mind. The sound of it washed away his concerns and fears, and any thought that something was wrong.

"Yes, my love," he said, now completely enslaved to her will.

She smiled, kissed him again, and then turned to leave the throne room with the authorization in hand to begin the mass enslavement and mind-wiping of whole worlds. In a matter of months, they would have sufficient forces to rival anything the pretender could throw at them.

The destruction would be glorious.

~~Last Jedi~~

~~Last Jedi~~

The ceremony was over. The reception was done. Tobin and Mariha stood alone in their honeymoon chambers on an artificial pleasure-moon orbing beyond the rings of shipyards that covered the planet of Kuat.

"So," the princess said with a tired smile.

"So," Tobin smiled back.

"It's done."

"Yes, your Majesty," he said with a nod.

She grinned, and then walked across the room to the opulent bar that was set out for them. She selected a fine Nalderaani red wine and poured the whole bottle out in two glasses. She carried them back and handed one to Tobin. "We're not quite done, though, are we?"

Tobin took the glass and sipped it. "I would never presume."

"Yes, you would. But that's not the point. I understand political necessity. I was raised with the understanding that I would marry for the best interests of the Empire. For the longest time I assumed it would be that ass of my cousin, Duke Dorstry. Nor am I naïve enough to stand here and tell you that I love you." She walked across the open suite until she stood beside the Imperial bed. "I will tell you this, though. I am attracted to you. I feel your power and determination in the Force because of how you opened my mind to it, and I think that with time, if you let me, I could very much come to love you."

She reached behind her neck, and with a few manipulations, her glorious white wedding dress somehow slid off her, revealing the enticing white garments underneath it. "I do not want to live a sham of a marriage if I don't have to, Tobin. I want to be your wife. Will you let me?"

Staring at this stunning vision, Tobin downed his chalice of white in four gulps and threw it casually over his shoulder where it shattered against the far wall. Smiling brilliantly, Mariha did the same, though she took longer, and threw it across the room to shatter on the far wall near the sitting area.

They came together with no more words, melting themselves to each other. Mariha reached out with her fledgling Force sense and felt his power responding, pulling her into himself even as she pulled his body into hers.

As they made love, Tobin leaned down until his lips brushed her ears, causing waves of hot and cold to run down her body, and said softly, "You have all the time you need, my princess. For myself—I have dreamed of you all my life. I have known you since we were children, and I have always loved you. Just as I love you now."

Mariha closed her eyes and smiled brilliantly, even as they moved together as one. "Yes," she whispered. It was all she needed to say.


	44. Job Well Begun

I apologize for not being able to post any review responses to the last chapter. I have had limited time this weekend. I did note however a mistake in the chapter numbering and corrected that for chapter 43.

Thank you for reading!

* * *

**Chapter Forty-Four: Job Well Begun**

Their Imperial Majesties, Emperor Tobin Solo Fel Artin and Empress Mariha Jana Fel Artin, first of the new Artin Dynasty, entered the briefing room hand-in-hand. To the assembled Moffs, Grand Moffs and System governors, they did not look like two of the most powerful and important people in the galaxy—they looked like young, deliriously happy newlyweds.

To the newly defected moffs, it was a startling realization that the infamous Tobin Artin was so young. It was even more startling to see that he and their Imperial princess looked at each other with such open affection—nay, even love. Their obvious feelings for each other seemed to illuminate the entire room, making everything a little brighter and more hopeful.

The Emperor graciously seated his wife before assuming his own seat at the head of the long, oval table aboard the converted cruise liner, _The Sword of Stars_. Once seated, the others in the room, numbering over thirty, sat at well.

For the newly joined, it was startling to see Tobin in his element. Though his wife sat on his right, to his left sat a most unusual sight—a uniformed, female Devaronnian. Females of that species rarely ventured into space, preferring instead to run things on their home planets. However, they also noted that this one wore the crisp, white uniform of a Grand Admiral First Class—meaning that she was essentially the highest ranking member of Artin's military forces.

To the left of the Princess sat a wide-bodied older man with startling blue hair and a large Unitarian sigil sown onto the right breast of his modest gray robes.

"Good morning," Tobin began. He spoke with clear, authoritative tones. Though young, it was obvious to even the most seasoned commanders that he was a man accustomed to and comfortable with command. "And more important, welcome. I have met with each of you individually yesterday, and with the enthusiastic support of Grand Moffs Hershied and Dinteri, I have determined going forward that you will be the new Moff College."

The beings around the table—made up of humans of both genders, two Mon Calamari, a Chiss and a handful of other species—accepted this news with quiet dignity.

"I am meeting with you together so that I can share with you my vision of the future. First, know that my wife is Empress not just in name, but in fact, and speaks with my voice. I know traditionally the Emperor has not vested any joint authority in his spouse. That might happen in the future as well. But given her own training, her own intellect, and the fact that frankly she has more experience in palaces than I, I have formally invested the Empress with full authority to act on my behalf and on behalf of the Empire. Should a difference of opinion occur, my opinion will rule of course." He then grinned unexpectedly. "If she lets it."

The laugh that the quip brought forth was completely unexpected, and left many of the newcomers both confused and strangely giddy. Few could remember the last time the Emperor made a joke that actually elicited genuine laughter from his people.

However, when the Empress added, "You're learning, dear," the laughter almost became guffaws.

When the laughter settled and droids handed out drinks, the meeting continued. "To our left is Grand Admiral Silmari Frark. She has been with me since the beginning of this venture, and I consider her my most loyal officer. I have placed her in overall command of all naval forces. However, both she and I understand that each of you brings with you great experience and specialized training, and I wish you to never hesitate to make suggestions. Our job is to make sure you can do your jobs well, and with a minimum of interference. You will never have black guards holding a blaster to your heads."

He nodded at the murmured appreciation. "To our right is Afton Shrief, a former senior administrator of the now lost world of Ulicia. He is also a Bishop of the Unitarian Church. I recognize that some of you will have to take time adjusting to this, but I wish you to understand that I am a Force-adept, or as the Unitarians would say, Force-blessed."

A droid in the back of the room floated into the air with a startled exclamation. Wide-eyed officers, many fifty and sixty year veterans, watched in silence.

"And that was me," the Empress added with a sly smile.

The wide-eyes widened further, but Tobin simply grinned. "Some of you may be wondering if I intend to bring the Jedi back. The answer is no. The Jedi were too insulated from the realities of the galaxy, and it was this insulation that led to their downfall, not once, but several times. It also brought home the fact that they could not learn from their mistakes. Instead, it is my intent to reinstitute the Imperial Knights. Those strong enough in the Force to harness it will be trained to serve the Empire. Not me personally, but the Empire. But not every child with high midi-chlorians can achieve their full potential. And so we will have an entire Order of the Empire, led by the Knights, but with other levels suitable for those best suited to serve. But ultimately, any Force-strong individuals will serve the Empire."

All humor fled his face. "I stress this. While the Emperors of old were wrong to try to stamp the Force from existence, the basis for their fears was valid. The Force was out of balance, and the wars between Sith and Jedi caused more needless death and destruction than anything else in the history of this galaxy. No more! The Force-born will walk the pinnacles' edge, striding between dark and light. We will be grey, and we will serve all people, rather than ourselves."

The entire room jumped in surprise at a loud _clap_. They turned to see Grand Moff Dila Hershied stand and clap. Beside her, Shol Dinteri stood as well. Soon others followed, until the whole room gave the Emperor a standing ovation.

"You didn't even have a chance to tell them about the church or the senate," Mariha said over the din.

Tobin smiled. "I will in time. For now, it's enough for them to know that I won't be resurrecting the ghosts of fears past."

~~Last Jedi~~

~~Last Jedi~~

The loyalist attack on Ralltiir was more than just a strategic move. Yes, Ralltiir was a financial hub of the galactic Core and near one of the major hyperspace trade routes, but the attack was also symbolic.

The Battle of Ralltiir during the Second Imperial Civil War marked the turning point against the last Sith Emperor, Darth Krayt, and the true Fel dynasty. The Imperial Security Directorate sent out massive waves of psyprop through the holonet explaining that the true Emperor was striking a blow against a new insurgence of Sith evil. While late in the game, most analysts agreed it was the first truly intelligent counter propaganda to Tobin Artin's own campaign.

The battle itself was short, bloody and decisive. The planet was defended by two Golan XII defense platforms and a recently defected group of two frigates, three corvettes and a pair of missile frigates.

The Blackguard fleet had four of the new heavy cruisers—ships approaching the size of the historic Imperial II-class star destroyer, but with modern armaments and propulsion systems, two hundred frigates and three hundred corvettes and missile frigates.

The defenders did not last ten minutes.

The battle in orbit was just a prelude, though. As soon as the ships were in orbit, the fleet launched its landing force. Shuttles carrying fearsome machines of war landed across the planet. The token forces the financial center could summon did not last long against soldiers who fought like droids—with emotionless eyes and brutal efficiency. The civilian leadership of the world that voted to side with Tobin Artin were publicly executed and a new loyalist governor was appointed over the broken world.

The Third Imperial Civil War had begun in earnest.

~~Last Jedi~~

~~Last Jedi~~

"Again, Aaris."

The newly turned eight-year-old apprentice somersaulted cleanly through the air, landed in a roll and brought his training saber up to engage the older Dantila Tierri. Dantila wielded a green training saber a little more clumsily than Aaris, but also with a longer arm and the added intelligence of an additional six years of living. Aaris did manage to get a sting to Dantila's leg that made the older girl yelp, but she got him right back with a stinging blow to his neck.

"Hold," Tobin called. "Dantila, well done. Aaris, losing a leg can be an inconvenience. Losing your head is a tragedy."

"Yes, Master."

"Go meditate and rest."

The two walked off the sparring floor while Tobin turned to his next two apprentices. Delton was only a year or two older than Aaris, while the newest initiate was only five years old. "Begin."

Fletcher Dunstallin moved with the grace of a child twice his age, his face furrowed in concentration as he hesitantly touched the Force. His contact with it was hesitant, but strong, promising of all four of the children, he would be the most natural user.

However, Delton was older and had a full year of training on their newest addition and had the younger boy disarmed in two minutes.

"Excellent job, both of you. And now for our last student."

On the training floor, Mariha was not Empress, nor was she even his wife, though it was difficult for both at times to make the distinction. Like the kids, she wore flexible training clothes that clung tightly to her body, with her distinctive red hair pulled back in a bun at the base of her skull.

"Ten creds she makes it to five minutes," Dantila whispered to Aaris.

"Deal," he said.

Tobin smirked. "They have money riding on you, Mariha. Make it count."

They did not use training sabers. Rather, they depended on Tobin's speed and skill, and the Force to keep them whole. After a year of intense training, he had to employ all three.

Mariha Jana Fel Artin proved with training to be a skilled, calculating duelist. She was only aggressive when the duel required her to be, and with experience was learning precisely when that point was. She also knew when to fall back into a more defensive form.

She also knew Tobin. He launched himself into the air with an aggressive leap and pushed with the Force at the same time. Mariha in turn threw herself away from the Force-push that would have flattened her and rolled easily away, before herself pushing at Tobin.

He deflected the Force-blow with one arm and fired a blast of Sith lightning at her. Her eyes widened at the unexpected ferocity of the attack—he never used lightning on her. She raised her saber and caught it, grimacing at the tendrils of energy that licked at her wrists. Fortunately the blast was only momentary, but was instead followed by a blur of red and blue light.

It was all she could do to defend herself. Twice she was forced to somersault over him, and once she ran up the side of the wall and used it to launched herself across the room. She tried a second time only for Tobin to catch her with his mind and toss her back.

Their duel lasted almost eight minutes before he finally managed to spin her saber out of her hand. She was ready for a painful Force-blow as a punctuation to the lesson, but instead received a searing, breath-taking kiss.

He parted, his eyes shining. "Brilliantly fought," he growled with a promise of passion.

"Why don't you ever kiss me when I do good!" Dantila said. She then blushed down to her neck when she realized what she said.

Tobin was too energized by the duel to mind. "While you are indeed a beautiful young lady, my apprentice, I am quite taken."

"Sorry, Master."

"Easily forgiven. All of you did well today. Yes, Aaris, even you. Your tutors are waiting for you for your classes. This evening, after you go home, I wish you to meditate and practice your levitation. Dismissed."

The four kids stood, bowed from the waist, and then walked out of the room chattering happily to each other. When they were gone, he turned to prepare for his day when his path was intercepted by two arms and two soft, luscious lips. Mariha parted from the kiss. "I did well?"

"For the time you have trained, you did remarkably well," he said. "The lightning was a test and you handled it well. Soon I'll show you how to absorb and reflect it, and then I'll show you how to master it."

"Sounds painful."

"It will be, sorry."

She shrugged. "So, care to help me clean up? I have difficulty scrubbing my back, you know."

Tobin was about to answer when he looked up to see Silmari walk into the room. She sniffed once and grinned a toothy, predator's smile. "I apologize for interrupting what was going to be much fun, but we have an issue that requires you."

"No rest for the wicked," Mariha muttered.

"Who wanted to rest?" Tobin asked with an innocent expression.

When the Emperor and Empress reached the Situation Room on Bastion, their appearance in tight-fitting fitness clothes raised one or two eyebrows—from both genders. Still, protocol was followed as everyone in the room snapped to attention.

"Be seated," Tobin said as he and his wife settled into their seats. "Shol, you look like you have something on your mind."

"Indeed I do, Majesty," the Grand Moff said. "And it's not good. We've been trying to determine how the Blackguard has been able to increase their forces so quickly. Well, we now know."

Tobin looked at the planet in surprise, then to Dinteri. "Is that…is that Kamino? They're using clones?"

"Conscription, conditioning, and yes, clones," Dinteri said. "The Kaminoans have built massive ship yards and are doing more than just growing clones, they've taken over the conditioning of the conscripts. I heard that Hubrin was toying with the idea of conditioning conscripts to be little more than organic droids, but now we know it's working. We still have a slight numerical advantage, but at this insane rate of production, it is possible they'll outpace us. They're creating crews for ships as fast as they're building them, on the order of a capital ship every few days. Their new heavy cruisers have a significant advantage over our frigates, as well."

"Is this the only site that we know of?"

"No, we believe they also have facilities in the Deep Core as well. We have a lot of spies on Corusca, but Hubrin is guarding the Deep Core facility well."

The past six months of war had seen minor exchanges between the over-sectors loyal to Tobin, and those loyal to the old Emperor. But the past two campaigns had gone very much in the loyalists' favor. Now they knew why.

Tobin paged through the report, concentrating. He then pulled up the report on Amorine Hubrin. "What do we know of the Diktat?"

"Ruthless and efficient," Dinteri said. "She is known to have seduced and then murdered her predecessor, but did it so perfectly that no one could prove anything. Her personal files have been sealed since I first heard her name, but her rise coincided with your own. The more powerful you became, the closer she got to the Emperor, until right before the Battle of Bastion, when she effectively became his sole advisor."

"The Force…" Mariha whispered.

The Grand Moffs at the meeting, either in person or by holonet, looked at their Empress in confusion. Tobin, though, merely nodded. "Yes, the Force itself abhors her. She is the real enemy here." He took a deep breath to calm himself. "What assets do we have available?"

"The Second, Third and Eighth fleet stand ready. Fifteen hundred ships total. More than that we would have to start pulling from defensive positions."

"Based on your intelligence, is that enough to take Kamino?"

Shol shook his head. "Unlikely, Majesty. From what we can see, Kamino had almost a dozen heavy weapons platforms and over two thousand ships on permanent station there."

"What about Corusca?"

"They have a permanent picket fleet of five hundred vessels and over fifty heavy weapons platforms," Hershied said, having led the study of Corusca's defenses.

Tobin nodded. "A battle, but one we could win." He switched the holo display to a close those of the Corusca sector. "We held Ruan against the last enemy offensive." It was not a question, and so none responded. "Does anyone know of any other ship graveyards besides Dubrillion?"

"Anoat," a gray-haired Moff said. "The planet has been dead biologically for many centuries. It served as a graveyard for the several oversectors."

Tobin nodded. "Very, very quietly, I want the Third Fleet engineers to start pulling hulls off of Anoat. Get them repaired enough to be able to hold orbit and make low hyperspeed, as many as possible. I want five thousand hulls in orbit around Ruan; more if we can swing it. At that same time, start pulling elements from those defense positions. I'll provide coordinates later."

"A lure?" Hershied said. "Corusca is important, but Kamino is more so."

"Agreed. However, it nothing else it will be an interesting test of just how much power the Emperor still retains."

"And if they fall for it?" Mariha asked.

"Whether they fall for it or not, we must take Kamino."

~~Last Jedi~~

~~Last Jedi~~

For the first time since assuming power openly, Tobin faced the other side of being Emperor. "You can't lead the assault, Tobin," Mariah said with worn patience. It was the second hour of the discussion. "Your place is here."

"I need to be there if it is a trap," Tobin insisted.

The Empress realized this was not a discussion she was going to win through ordinary means. Instead, she leaned across the divan they sat on in their private quarters on Bastion and kissed him hard enough to steal his breath. "Do you trust your staff?" she asked when they parted.

"The Force would warn me…."

"Do you trust your staff?" she asked again.

Tobin sighed. "Yes."

"Tobin, listen to me, please. Taklon Chinlee has been leading men in the navy for almost seventy years. He was advising my grandfather! Your own Silmari will be with him. This may be the hardest lesson for you to learn, but you cannot be both general and Emperor. It's time to pick, Tobin. You chose this role, now you have to live with it."

"Perhaps you're right," Tobin finally acceded, "but when it comes time to take Corusca, we must be there."

"I know. But for now, let your people do their jobs."

"Fine."

~~Last Jedi~~

~~Last Jedi~~

Tobin and his wife watched with Shol Dinteri and Dila Hershied on a secured holonet display as Taklon brought the special Kamino Task Force into play.

Their initial ploy of luring forces to Coruscant with the emptied fleet proved to have limited success. Their intelligence—which had a multitude of spies in the palace—assured them that the old Emperor was demanding additional forces to guard Coruscant. However, Hubrin complied by only sending fifty ships—a paltry number compared to the two thousand in orbit over Kamino. It was a telling move on who now wielded the true power in the old Empire.

Chinlee's task force had only three thousand ships, and the numerical difference was almost eliminated by the massive weapons platforms that orbited the watery world of Kamino. Tobin purposely did not know the exact tactics Chinlee would use—his only orders were to take the planet by any means necessary.

It soon became apparent that Taklon Chinlee was not just experienced, the man was brilliant. He brought his entire fleet in at the magnetic poles of the planet, taking advantage of the intense magnetic field Kamino generated, and then cut off one quarter of the defensive formation from the rest using the planet's own horizon in a lightning-fast strike reminiscent of Tobin's own attempt to save Ulicia. Only this time Chinlee had a massive fleet of ships to make the effort.

Through real-time feeds and the tactical viewer, the spectators watched as Taklin's concentrated strike overwhelmed the isolated defensive corridor, while the rest of the planetary defenses scrambled to bring themselves into the battle.

By the time the weapons platforms cleared the horizon, Taklon's taskforce finished sweeping through the corridor and moved away from the opposite pole of the planet, once again riding the magnetic waves. In their wake they left almost three hundred destroyed ships and another two hundred heavily damaged, while only losing fifty in return.

An hour later, he struck again, having brought the entire fleet back around. This time the enemy commanders stationed one of their massive weapons platforms at each pole, but the slow-moving monstrosities were not fast enough to do more than strafe Task Force as it flew by, isolated yet another corridor of the defense, and once again swept through.

This time, Taklon's forces did not just concentrate on destroying enemy vessels. The _Sword of Stars_, just one of his ships, unleashed its superlaser on the shields of the planet, cracking the otherwise unbreakable layering of shields. This allowed a veritable blizzard of bombers and fighter escorts to descent on the world.

Kamino's defenders were not without fighters of their own, but there were enough bombers that none had any doubt they would be successful. The squadrons of smaller ships concentrated on the shield arrays themselves, and by the time Taklon's fleet moved away from the world, leaving behind even more carnage, the planetary shields started to collapse sector by sector.

The next attack did not wait an hour. Taklon brought his fleet around and hit the defenders head on, changing tactics mid-battle with stunning effect. The defending fleet had already begun to disperse toward the poles, believing that's where the next attack would come, when they were caught in the flank by an all out end-game attack.

Watching the battle was the most emotionally exhausting thing Tobin had ever been through. All his life he fought on the edge, putting his personal skills and Force ability on the line. This time, he was forced by circumstance to sit back and watch from a distance as others took up his cause, and he was astounded by how difficult it was.

In the end, despite having only slightly higher numbers, Taklon Chinlee destroyed the defenders of Kamino and devastated the planet itself, obliterating all the cloning facilities and reducing their massive shipyards to atomized dust.

"His record remains intact," Dila said.

"Forty two major battles without a loss," Mariah said with a smile. "The man's a legend."

"In his own mind, at the least," Shol added.

Their conversation ended when the tactical display shifted into a three dimensional representative of Admiral Chinlee's head. "Your majesty, I'm happy to announce that Kamino has been neutralized."

"Losses?" Tobin said.

"Higher than I would prefer, but percentage-wise very acceptable. We lost eight hundred forty two capital ships and nine hundred fighters and bombers representing twenty-eight and twenty-one percent of total craft brought to battle. Enemy casualties were one-hundred percent."

A moment later Silmari's head appeared next to Chinlee's. "Admiral Chinlee has performed your miracle, Tobin," she said, still finding it difficult to use a title. "I have learned much from him."

"Good, because you're not done yet," Tobin said.

"Oh, I know, Majesty," Taklon said. "We still have the Deep Core facility. My friends can tell you how I despise leaving a job undone. Until then, by your leave?"

"Granted. Excellent work, Admiral."

And with that, the Battle of Kamino came to an end.


	45. End Game

**Chapter Forty-Five: End Game**

The Deep Core task force, still under the joint command of Taklon and Silmari, received reinforcements composed of two thousand Vong heavy cruiser-analogues, but when they arrived at the supposed location of the second site on the planet Weyland, they discovered their preparations were overkill.

The facility in the Deep Core was only a fraction of the size of the one in Kamino, with six hundred capital ships in orbit that were quickly destroyed. Their best searches, though, could not determine how long the facility had been operational or if other ships were made and simply not present. Still, it seemed to be a compelling victory.

Weeks after the destruction of the two facilities, Loyalist forces began to pull back from their defensive strongholds, leaving worlds that previously supported Emperor Fel alone and vulnerable. Tobin's forces did not hesitate to move in, though in most cases they found resistance among the natives light. On some worlds, they also heard horror stories of mass, forced conscription from among all strata of society, where the conscription victims would undergo what amounted to a death of personality in the "conditioning vats on Kamino".

The enemy retreated over the next few weeks, and more and more systems came under the umbrella of the new Empire, until five months after the destruction of Kamino and the Deep Core facility, it seemed as if every loyalist ship pulled back to Coruscant.

Tobin's fledgling administration found itself strained as it quickly incorporated the newly freed worlds, many of which were in terrible need of humanitarian aid. But with new worlds also came new resources, and in time aid shipments began flowing through Tobin's empire, as did commerce.

Meanwhile, Tobin and his administration quickly consolidated their positions and established a blockade around the Corusca System. With so many loyalist ships, they had no hope of stopping any concentrated movement out, but they could at least monitor such movement.

Tobin and Mariha were horrified, though, when a month into the blockade they began to receive chilling reports of what was happening on Corusca. The people were being starved to death. Riots were put down with such overwhelming violence that those who survived turned to cannibalism just to stay alive. The rest of the newly appointed Moff College listened to the reports in horror, unable to believe how far their old Emperor had fallen.

The Imperial couple assembled the Moff College seven months after the fall of Kamino to plan the end game.

"We can no longer stand by and let this continue," the young Emperor said. "The people suffering on Corusca are our people. Regardless of who they supported originally, if I am to be Emperor, then I must be Emperor and protector for all people."

"We concur, Majesty," Dinteri said. "We've doing battle projections and based on the remaining number of enemy forces in Corusca, we predict we will need ten thousand ships. I have coordinated with my opposite number with the Sekotan Vong forces and we believe we can do that, but it will be an End Game attack. Failure to win the day will leave all our forces severely weakened."

"There was never any doubt in my mind that the war depended on this last battle," Tobin said softly. "Shol, the order is given. Take all measures necessary to ensure the conquest of Corusca. And know that we I will be there as well. In this last battle, we must be present. The Force compels us."

"Yes, Majesty," Dinteri said. The rest of the college looked uncomfortable at having their emperor at such a large and potentially devastating battle.

~~Last Jedi~~

~~Last Jedi~~

Tobin finished the class, please at the progress his young apprentices were making. The kids were joined by two more, whose parents felt safe enough in the new regime to come forward voluntarily. Both were Aaris's age and showed promise.

The children bowed to him, thanked him for the lesson, and then returned home. When they were gone, Tobin started his solo work out, pushing himself to his limit. There was a terrible tension in the Force—a feeling that things were rushing headlong to a danger that he could not predict. And so he pushed himself like he hadn't done since Korriban, exercising every skill he had.

Mariha, who was tending to their travel arrangements, arrived after the lesson to find her husband working himself in a way she hadn't seen before. Slana, her constant companion and now her formal Lady in Waiting, felt her eyes widen at what should have been impossible for any mortal being.

Finally he finished, breathing hard and drenched in sweat. He nodded to the two ladies, having sensed them upon their entry. "Is the ship ready?"

"We'll be on the _Miraluka_," she said. "She's been refitted with stronger shields and a weapon's packet for the battle."

He smiled. "Thank you. Do you feel it?"

"Feel what?" Slana couldn't help but ask.

Mariha, though, merely nodded. "There's something more than just enemy ships waiting for us, isn't there?"

"Yes," Tobin said. "I begin to wonder if Hubrin has the Force."

"Do you think Corusca's a trap?"

Tobin hung his lightsabers to his belt and summoned a towel to his hand from across the room to wipe his face. "That's just it—even if it was a trap—they have no other resources. Since the pull back, even worlds that were previously loyal were so traumatized by the conscription methods that she has lost all credibility. Her rise to power was so intelligently done, her seeming lack of concern doesn't make sense. They can't win, not with one world against the whole galaxy."

Mariha had no response.

~~Last Jedi~~

~~Last Jedi~~

It took two weeks to assemble the largest fleet in the history of the Empire. Outlying systems were stripped to bare defenses as every able ship and crew joined to "liberate" Corusca. For that was the term Tobin's psy-prop engineers used to spin the attack. It did not take much effort, since the reports of starving citizens and brutal methods used to keep them under control spread through the galaxy.

Corusca had over a trillion sentient beings living on it, making it the single most populous world in the galaxy. Beings of every species from almost every world in the galaxy lived there because of its role as capital of the Empire. For all those people to essentially be held at gunpoint was a point even the most ardent loyalists had difficulty defending.

Unlike Taklon's attack on Kamino, the numbers involved were simply too large to attempt a tricky attack vector. With so many ships, they would literally crash into each other if they tried to approach over a pole. Of course, Corusca's magnetic fields were relatively weak anyway, so they would not provide much shelter regardless.

Instead, the fleet came into the system in three attack groups of over thirty-three hundred ships each, grouped together by size and firepower. The approached hesitantly, each group led by tens of thousands of fighters and bombers scouting for mines or other defensive works in the outlying system.

Aboard the _Miraluka_, Tobin and Mariha watched on the tactical displays as their forces slowly and cautiously moved through the outlying system until they came within sight of Corusca itself on a parabolic course along the system's ecliptic plane.

Tobin felt his wife stiffen and resisted the urge to shake his head as well. Six thousand black-guard ships ringed the planet, with dozens upon dozens of weapons platforms. The ten-thousand ship estimate was frankly optimistic.

"Majesty," Taklon's voice emerged from a speaker on the tactical holodisplay, "the enemy still has not launched any fighter intercept, nor have they aligned their fleet. They remain in a ring formation around the planet. It is unusual behavior."

Dinteri's voice joined them. "Dila and I agree. This is highly aberrant behavior. The ships are leaving themselves exposed to our fighter attack. They've raised their shields, but so far have not attempted to align themselves to our attack."

"Tobin, one of the weapons platforms are moving!" Silmari's purring voice said. "It is…firing on the planet!"

"What?" Mariha said.

Tobin, though, felt his stomach clench as they watched a Tendandro weapons platform realign its massive weapons array and start firing giga-ton level turbolaser cannon blasts at the surface. The firing continued for thirty seconds before it stopped. In those thirty seconds, a hundred square kilometers were obliterated. The Force cried out in pain from the hundreds of thousands who died.

"They never intended to defend the planet," Tobin whispered.

"Incoming message!" Captain Deastri said. "From the planet. It's the old Emperor."

"Put it through," Tobin said.

The tactical display disappeared, replaced by the holographic image of Antias Fel. "Hello, cousin," he said, obviously seeing holographic representations of Tobin and Mariha. "Daughter."

"I thought you had no daughter," Mariha said, not able to mask the hurt in her voice despite all her training.

"I was wrong," the Emperor said simply. The man Tobin saw when captured was gone, replaced with a wasted caricature of a man. His face looked thin and drawn, and the circles around his eyes were dark.

"Your forces are surrounded, Majesty," Tobin said. "There is no reason to fight. Surrender the planet, and you will be treated honorably."

The Emperor snorted. "My young friend, do you honestly think I still control the forces around this planet? I would sooner die that order ships to fire on my own people. But I no longer have that authority. Diktat Hubrin now has direct command of all military forces, and has stated that she is fully prepared to glass the entire surface of Corusca if her demands are not met."

"And what are those demands?"

"Your head," Antias said simply. "She has instructed me to ask how many lives your life is worth, cousin. Are you, by yourself, worth more than the trillion beings on this world? How much blood is the life of any Emperor worth?"

Tobin said nothing at first, while Mariha took his hand. Instead, he stared into the beaten, hollow eyes of the man he once believed was his enemies. "I will need time to consider it."

"The platform will fire again in twenty minutes if we don't hear from you," Antias said. He sounded utterly defeated before his image flickered off.

"You can't be thinking about going down there," Mariha said.

"I may not have a choice," Tobin said. "Silmari, Taklon, Shol and Dila, I want you to reposition the fleet to match the enemy formation. Ship on ship. Silmari, have the _Sword of Stars_ ready to take out the weapons platforms. I want every enemy ship clearly targeted by at least one of our vessels." He turned to Mariha. "Do you trust me?"

"Tobin…"

"I realized now that this is where it has been heading all along," he said, speaking intensely to her. "You've had enough training that if necessary you can continue with the kids." He gently down and rested a hand on her stomach. "And our future has been assured," he whispered.

"How…yes," she said. "I wanted to be sure myself before I told you." Her eyes grew misty. "She's going to kill you."

"And my blood will pave the way for the future of the Empire and the Force," he said urgently. "But don't think I'm going to walk to my death easily. Not when I have you and our child to live for."

The rest of the bridge and command staff faded away as the two looked into each other's eyes, bonding together as one in the Force. Command staff found their eyes suddenly watering and had to look away.

Holding his wife's hand tightly, Tobin turned back to the holo emitter and nodded to the communications officer. A moment later Antias Fel's face appeared.

"In return for the complete, unconditional surrender of all loyalist forces and the guarantee that no more civilians will be killed, I agree to Hubrin's terms," Tobin said clearly.

"Very noble," the old Emperor said, still in a hollow voice. "You are to proceed directly to the main bay of the Imperial Palace where you will be escorted to the throne room. Come alone."

The connection ended abruptly. A moment later, Tobin opened communications throughout the fleet. "This is the Emperor," he began. "We have seen what steps the true enemy is willing to take. And now the people know the value of an Emperor's life. I will never allow a world to burn while I can stop it, even if it means my life. But the new Empire will live on through the Empress, and the son she carries. It was by the Will of the Force that we married, and it is by the Will of the Force that I go now to meet the enemies of the Empire. Be strong, and be ready for treachery, but also know that every one of you have my profound and humble gratitude for all you have done. May the Force be with you all."

He turned to Mariha and whispered, "The moment they power up their weapons, take them out."

"I will," she promised before kissing him tenderly. "Come back to me, Tobin."

"If the Force wills it," he said. "I pray that it does."

~~Last Jedi~~

~~Last Jedi~~

The surface of Corusca screamed its pain into the Force. Millions were dead already, and billions more suffered. The effect was of a painful throbbing in the Force, and a buzzing in the back of Tobin's head like a million distant voices crying out.

He piloted the standard Imperial Shuttle himself, not wishing to risk the wrath of Amorine Hubrin before his fleet was adequately positioned to mitigate an orbital barrage. Below, he could see the open scars on the skywalks and promenades that lined the upper city, and occasionally the craters burned deep into the megastructures that covered the planet where orbital turbolaser cannons put down localized resistance.

What he did not see was any sky traffic at all—not a single speeder made its way over the planet. He could not see any evidence of life at all, if fact. The planet at first seemed deserted, but through the Force he knew the truth—the people were hiding in terror.

The palace, though, could not be hidden. Rising as high above the other structures as those structures rose above the long-hidden planetary surface; rising high enough to interrupt planetary weather patterns; rising high enough that the upper parts were considered in low orbit. The palace rose like a dragon before the shuttle. The air around it glimmered with powerful shields, obviously repaired from his raid to free the princess the year before. He flew toward it now, sensing a darkness within the structure that had nothing to do with the old Emperor.

No fighters came to meet him; no soldiers lined the promenade with anti-space craft artillery. He flew directly into the cavernous main hangar, which was easily large enough to accommodate more than one frigate, and continued flying through the empty ship cradles until he spotted a large landing platform at the very back of the hangar. The platform was lined with what looked like black-armored troopers—Blackguards.

Tobin had a feeling in his gut he had not experienced since Bespin, when he had no choice but to surrender to Hershied. Still, he kept his hands steady as he guided the shuttle into a smooth landing on the pad. He did not hesitate to open the ramp and walk out; as he did so he counted the lines of Blackguards—two hundred easily. They stood in silent formation; however in the Force they felt…dead. Conditioned, then.

Oddly, the soldiers made to move to stop him as he walked toward the sole turbolift at the end of the platform. Rather, their very formation acted like a funnel, so that Tobin would not mistake his intended destination.

With the Force swirling around him, he walked up the steps to the waiting Turbolift and stepped inside. It shot up without hesitation and continued for two minutes before they reached the final destination—the Imperial Throne Room.

He stepped out of the lift to find the room brilliantly lit, but almost completely empty. The only Force presence he felt was that of the old Emperor at the far side of the room, slouched in his throne. With no reason to do otherwise, Tobin walked brusquely to his father in law.

Since Tobin's capture, the Emperor had become a literally shell of his former self. His hair had thinned and grown lanky with lack of care. His cheeks were sunken and there were dark circles around his dull eyes. When he moved, his clothes looked ill-fitted, as if he had lost a great deal of wait.

"Tobin," the Emperor said, greeting him like an old friend. "I trust my daughter is safe?"

"She and your future grandson are both safe," Tobin said.

For a moment, life returned to the old man's eyes. "Grandson? Hmmm, good for you, I suppose. I wish I could congratulate you more, but I hate you too much. This is all your fault, you know. Hubrin might have done it, but she wouldn't have been able to if not for you."

"You don't believe that, Antias. Even when you lie to yourself, your lies lack conviction."

The old man sighed and straightened himself on his throne. "Perhaps. None of it matters, though. I first thought she wanted to help me save my Empire. For a brief time I thought she might love me. But in the end I realized the truth of it all."

"The truth of what?"

"The truth that I hate all of you," a new voice said.

Genuinely surprised, Tobin turned about with both lightsabers active as Amorine Hubrin sauntered across the vast space of the throne room. Even looking at her, Tobin could not feel her in the Force at all.

"What are you?" he demanded. "Are you Sith?"

"No," she said with a laugh that sounded almost…giddy? "I wiped them out as thoroughly as I did the Jedi. Or so I thought. But despite everything, I am content with what has happened."

Hubrin walked past him to the throne. Antias said nothing as Hubrin twirled his lank hair in her fingers. "This one was so much easier to manipulate than his ancestor. Ronan may have been a treacherous little bastard, but he had a strong mind. It took years to convince him to kill his sister and declare the Force anathema."

The whole world seemed to sway as his mind processed what this woman—this creature—was saying. "You started the pograms?"

"Oh, I did so much more than that. When Darth Krayt failed and fell, I started guiding the next Sith until war began again—glorious, bloody war. And when it was done and the Galaxy bled, I convinced Ronan it was all the fault of the Jedi and the Sith. And when I convinced him with your ancester's death, he could assume the throne and fix everything—well, everyone has their weakness. But this one—he was blinded by his need for love. Petty, human. With his daughter leaving him and my legs open, he thought he found in me what he needed. And once he was ensnared, his soul was mind. His very blood."

"But for what?" Tobin said, truly trying to understand. "Your actions did not hurt me—your actions compelled the galaxy to rise up sooner. You never had a chance."

She leaned forward, grinning darkly. "You young fool—this was never about saving the Empire. It was—and always has been—about destroying it. About destroying the Fel Dynasty. I used you just as I used him, but you're as much a part of the Dynasty as he is. And here we are." She tapped the throne's holorelay. "Admiral, you may attack when ready."

~~Last Jedi~~

~~Last Jedi~~

"Enemy ships are powerful up weapons!" Silmari growled.

Mariha nodded. "All ships, this is the Empress. We are betrayed. Open fire and do not stop until every enemy vessel is destroyed!"

~~Last Jedi~~

~~Last Jedi~~

The palace shuddered as the sky beyond caught fire. Tobin closed his eyes to try and push the screams of the dying from his mind. "So much death, but why?" he said, opening his eyes again to stare at Hubrin. "What have we done to you to fill you with such hate?"

Even Tobin jumped at the sound of Antias Fel's neck snapping. Hubrin had barely moved as she killed the old Emperor. His body slid off the throne room to fall unmoving to the floor. She seemed almost to flow into the throne. "How is your history, young Fel?"

"I know more than many."

"Then we will test your knowledge. What do you know of the battle of Karthakk?"

In the distance, a chandelier fell as the whole palace rattled from the orbital barrage. Tobin counted seven seconds before it hit the floor with a resounding crash. "I've never even heard of the planet."

"Not a planet, a System. There was a battle between your ancestor and my mate. Your ancestor won, but I never forgot."

Tobin winced as more people died. "I don't understand. What ancestor?"

"Anakin Skywalker," Hubrin said. "The ultimate founder of the new Fel Dynasty. Everything that made you great came through Jaina Solo Fel, Anakin Skywalker's granddaughter. He killed my mate, and for this crime, I will kill the last of his seed."

~~Last Jedi~~

~~Last Jedi~~

"Ships have just dropped out of hyperspace behind us!" Hershied announced from the bridge of the ship she commanded. "Three thousand Blackguard assault cruisers."

"I see them," Chinlee said. "Why are they flying in such tight formation?"

All of their ruminations were cut off when Shol said, "They're heading straight for the _Miraluka_! They're going for the Empress! Captain Deastri, get Mariha out of there now!"

~~Last Jedi~~

~~Last Jedi~~

Tobin felt the Force screaming in warning. He lit his lightsabers again. "Whatever plot you have going, I can't let it continue. Too many innocent people are dying."

"There are no innocents," Hubrin said. "Only victims and victimizers. And for my mate, I shall by the latter."

Tobin launched himself forward, only to be stopped mid air and thrown back with stunning power when Hubrin held up her arm, and then shot it out in an obscene explosion of exposed muscle and nerve. He felt her hand expand around his chest and squeeze even as she pushed him back.

He felt one rib snap before he swung his saber down and around and severed the suddenly long limb. Hubrin screamed and seemed to balloon out, stretching her uniform until it shredded before a bulbous mass of blue and red musculature with no sign of the woman she used to be.

Tobin fell to his back and with a push of the force righted himself as he saw the grotesque transformation.

"And now you see the truth!" Hubrin said in a hollow voice that echoed through the empty throne room. "I am Gen'Dai! I am the last of my kind. You humans burned my world and my people, and your ancestor killed Durge, my mate and the last male of my species. Anakin Skywalker condemned the Gen'Dai to extinction. And now his descendants will all die for it!"


	46. Durge's Revenge

**Chapter Forty-Six: Durge's Revenge**

The moment Tobin's shuttle left the _Miraluka_, Chinlee began repositioning ships around the planet. The Blackguards had 6,253 corvettes, frigates and the large assault cruisers in orbit around the planet, while Tobin's forces attacked with just over 10,200 capital ships.

Because of the numerical superiority, they were able to match ship sizes well enough and double-up on those larger ships that could take a larger beating. By the time Tobin landed and the fleet sensors alerted Mariha that the enemy was about to open fire, her own ships were in position.

They opened fire before the Blackguards had a chance to do so themselves.

Even so, capital ships were built to withstand horrific punishment. Even as the _Miraluka_ and other ships began to beat down on the unresisting Blackguard ships, the enemy themselves were firing on the surface with devastating effect. Still, the barrage could only last so long. Blackguard ships started blossoming in flame as the Tobin's fleet began to take their toll.

Things seemed to be going too easy for the threat Mariha felt in the Force, so the appearance of another three thousand enemy ships should not have surprised her. What did surprise her, though, was Shol Dinteri's voice screaming over the holo emitter, "They're heading straight for the _Miraluka_! They're going for the Empress! Captain Deastri, get Mariha out of there now!"

The scarred Captain Taryn Deastri, former Wookiee slave transport captain, responded with a screamed flurry of orders. The tight formation of enemy ships attacked with frightening efficiency, cutting through the now thinned Imperial fleet to hone in directly on the _Miraluka_.

The refurbished _Scythe-_class heavy cruiser had recently been refit with the strongest shields available in the galaxy, and it was only because of these shields that the ship survived the initial bombardment from the vanguard of the attacking ships. Even so, the sheer kinetic force form that first wave of concussion missiles knocked Mariha, Slana and every other person not seated to the floor.

Deastri continued shouting orders even as she picked herself up, and through the viewports the planet-scape spun dizzily as the _Miraluka_ began a hard burn down toward the surface. Mariha heard other voices through the holo relay, including Shol's familiar voice ordering their ships to collapse in behind the _Miraluka_ to buy the Empress time to escape.

The problem, however, was that their forces were spread in an even blanket around the whole planet, which, Mariha realized, was the whole point. The nearest ship was hundreds of klicks away, though it was approaching quickly and already firing.

"Captain, we've lost after shields completely! The reactor's taking fire!"

Deastri turned her scarred face to the Empress, and then to Slana. "Get her out of here!" the captain said to Slana. "We're dead!"

Reality froze for a moment as Mariha comprehended what the captain and the Force was telling her—the _Miraluka_ was now crippled and would soon die a fiery death. She was up before Slana was and had her lady in waiting by the arm as they ran toward the nearest executive escape chutes. Behind them, the Captain gave the order to abandon ship while in the space around them the new Imperial fleet converged on the Blackguards to try and stave off the inevitable.

~~Last Jedi~~

~~Last Jedi~~

"You move in slow motion to me, Artin," the being that was once Amorine Hubrin said. To prove her point, a pseudo-pod like limb shot out almost faster than even Tobin at the height of Force awareness could avoid. But just as the Gen'Dai were the penultimate survivers, living for thousands of years, Tobin was the pinnacle of the Force.

He cart-wheeled over the blow and brought down another chandelier onto Hubrin's…well, the part of her where her head would have been.

She made a strange, hollow growl as she threw the five ton lighting fixture off and charged Tobin at astounding speed. Rather than try to avoid her, he caught her in the Force and tossed her through the air, only to have another of her obscene limb extensions shoot down and swat him away like an insect.

Hubrin landed with a wet thud and instantly reformed into a bulging, bipedal mass of muscle and nerve tissue. She shot out limb without pause. Tobin, trying to heal himself in the Force from the massive blow, had no choice but to defend himself with the Force. He caused her blow to go wide, and then threw one of his sabers to amputate the limb. As the saber came back to him, another limb snatched the fallen one, and in seconds she had it reattached to her body.

Even in the midst of the fight of his life, he could feel the Force screaming in warning for others. He knew Hubrin's threat did not just extend to him—somehow she was threatening Mariha as well.

~~Last Jedi~~

~~Last Jedi~~

"Mariha, are you rated to fly?" Slana asked hysterically as she and Mariha climbed into the captain's launch. Behind them, more bridge crew—those specifically assigned to this as their escape craft—came on board as well.

The Empress said, "Tobin's been teaching me!"

The last to arrive was Deastri herself. "Go, go go! The reactor's been breached!"

The captain's barge was a heavily modified shuttle with enhanced shields and two torpedo launchers to augment the four laser cannons in sported. It would be hardpressed to go against a capital ship, but it could hold its own against anything short of that. It was also very, very fast.

Mariha pushed the thrusters to full power as the emergency systems kicked in and used a powerful magnetic pulse to shoot the barge out from under the bridge of the _Miraluka_ at full sublight. Even with dampening systems, the pull was enough cause those inside not strapped down to fall. Mariha immediately banked hard right, following a warning from the Force, which allowed them to avoid the concussion missile that passed by.

Deastri stumbled forward until she reached the weapons station. "Majesty, I hope you're up for this," the captain said.

Mariha did not answer; she was not even fully aware of the others in the ship as, for the very first time, she allowed herself to sink wholly, completely into the Force. She felt her husband on the planet, fighting for his life against and impossible foe; she felt the crews of her fleet watching in horror as a battle group hunted her mercilessly; she felt the massive hulks of burned out Blackguard ships littering the space around the planet.

She discovered that the blood of her ancestors flowed true in her.

"Holy stars!" Slana screamed as Mariha banked around a burned-out heavy cruiser so close to the dead hulk they scraped paint off the hull. She put the barge into a tight barrel roll as she did so, using the rotating and timing even Tobin would not have been able to handle, to flit through a hole punched in the Blackguard ship's hull. Behind her, the lead pursuing ship hit the dead craft full on.

Though Deastri could not tell how she knew, she felt the Empress's desire and fired a single proton torpedo into the fray, and with a spectacular explosion the hulk's still simmering reactor exploded in a brilliant white flash that destroyed the lead pursuer as well.

"I understand now," Mariha whispered to herself. "We don't use the Force. We _are_ the Force. And the Force is us."

Around them, though the pilots and captains did not understand why, everyone in the Imperial fleet suddenly knew exactly what they had to do. The convergences went from a desperate race to one point to organized thrusts along a stepped path out of the thick of the battle and into open space. The attacking capital ships launched their fighters for the first time, but already loyal fighters had arrived to defend the barge. Their pilots fought with a precision not seen in hundreds of years, quickly and easily decimating the conditioned, lobotomized pilots employed by the Blackguard.

And yet still the Blackguard ships came, relentless as droids. Mariha spun the ship around on its axis, allowing momentum to carry her forward and to the right abruptly as she continued on full burn. Though it momentarily exposed the side of the barge to fire, the exposure did not last long enough for the pursuing ships to take advantage of it, and in moments she was flying under the hull of the _Hubris_, the ship that gave Tobin and his mother a home after they fled Nalderaan.

The massive _Pellaeon_-class star destroyer, refitted and lethal, barreled into the formation of Blackguard ships without hesitation—one big destroyer against twenty-nine hundred ships. Yet so determined where the Blackguards that they did not even fire on the _Hubris_, which was fine for Dila Hershied, the commander of the behemoth.

As the Blackguard ships flew by, she unleashed duel broadsides of every concussion missile the huge ship had, accompanied by a massive barrage of turbolaser fire. Four of the Blackguard ships simply evaporated under the onslaught. She continued firing, tagging half the ships before they finally blew by her.

Mariha had already turned, controlling her barge with unbelievable finesse as the ship danced around the heavy turbolaser and missile fire. She flew into a loose formation of loyalist frigates and corvettes, and once again the Blackguards took heavy fire while concentrating solely on her.

One shot got through and the barge began to spin wildly.

And then the _Sword of Stars_ arrived. The converted Ithorian liner piled into the Blackguards with the superlaser blasting away, while the whole fleet could hear Grand Admiral Silmari growling threats against those who would threaten Tobin's mate.

More loyalist ships arrived. "Empress, are you well?" came Shol's voice.

"I'm alright, but the ship is damaged."

"Who was your pilot?"

"I was."

Mariha smiled at the pause that followed. "Mariha, lass, that was the most incredible flying I have ever seen in my life. Make for the _Goddess_ in high orbit. It's over, Princess."

"Not yet, it isn't," Mariha said. "I'm going to the surface. Have landing parties join me at the palace."

"Empress, are you sure?"

"I'm sure, Shol. Hubrin is not a human—the threat she represents is too great. Tobin needs me."

"Then go. We'll handle things up here."

~~Last Jedi~~

~~Last Jedi~~

Tobin fought with a ferocity and skill that would have made Darth Valus proud. He defended himself with a skill that would have left his mother ablaze with love.

It was not enough.

Two thousand years of hate boiled out of the Gen'Dai, and the hate had learned several trips along the way. Whenever he got close, she deployed personal energy shields to hold off his sabers while she attacked with those grotesque limbs of hers. Force kinetic attacks were next to useless, and his Force lightning did little more than irritate her and make her move faster.

Worst of all was the constant stream of insults and taunts about how his wife was killed.

But still he fought, because he knew there was no surrender. The Force itself assured him of this. If he failed, the future itself could fail.

~~Last Jedi~~

~~Last Jedi~~

Mariha chose not to try and land first—but only because of Slana and Deastri's warnings. The warnings were right, though. She came down into the middle of a massive firefight. Tens of thousands of Blackguard soldiers poured out of the palace while the palace defenses themselves played havoc with the attackers.

General Kenth Shandor himself led the assault from behind a pair of hovering Armageddon tanks. Mariha brought the shuttle down behind the tanks and rushed out with Slana to determine the situation. Shandor looked at the Empress when she arrived with open horror. "What in the Force are you doing here?" he demanded, momentarily forgetting himself.

"Tobin needs me!" she said.

"We're getting plastered!" Shandor said. "We're going to need five times the troops we have before we can even make a dent in the palace."

"What if I can get you in from underneath?" Slana said. "It was the way Tobin showed me to rescue Mariha. It was an old sewer tank from the first Empire. If we blast our way down to the tank, we could lead an assault force of heavy-armored troopers into the palace itself."

"Do you know where the pipe is?"

Mariha closed her eyes, reaching out with the Force. "I do," she said. She walked over to the general's hastily assembled table. "Punch a hole down at these coordinates."

"Why not?" Shandor said. He called the coordinates in for a barrage, and in minutes massive bolts of green light shot down from the sky, impacting a point five clicks away with such fury the whole area shook as if from an Earthquake.

The barrage lasted for three full minutes before Shandor pressed his earpiece closer. "I'll be damned, the ships in orbit say their comscans have detected a shielded pipe." 

Mariha gave Slana a hug, and then turned to Shandor. "We need armor. We're leading the assault."

"Empress, are you sure? If anything…"

"I'm not leading it as Empress, Kenth. I'm leading it as the only Imperial Knight you have."

Shandor looked down at Mariha's lightsaber, and then absently put a hand to the Unitarian sigil he war. "And who am I to refuse a knight?" he said reverently.

~~Last Jedi~~

~~Last Jedi~~

The thought that Tobin was going to lose came with an odd, detached calm. It was different than what he felt in the Force-free cell in this very palace, facing the execution squad. It was instead the knowledge that the Force was with him, and that even with his death, he would not end.

Even with the Force he struggled with terrible exhaustion. The fight was now easily in its second hour, the longest sustained fight he had ever experienced, and Hubrin showed no signs of tiring.

He could hear voices in the Force, whispering to him. Their messages were all one—comfort and peace. He was One with the Force. Death could not truly touch him; only move him from one phase of existence to another.

These thoughts came to him as he fought a desperate and losing rearguard action against Hubrin. The Gen'Dai was unlike any opponent he had ever fought, and he wondered repeatedly how his ancestor was able to beat one. He could not have known that Durge had been insane at the end, driven so by centuries of torture and abuse, and though he had nearly destroyed Anakin Skywalker, it was his insanity at the end that gave Skywalker the opening he needed.

Hubrin might have been insane as well, but her rage did not change her fighting style. She fought with cold, lethal precision. She was a living bundle of nerves and muscle, without bone or even a central nervous system. Her awareness was instantaneous and a thousand times faster than mere human. She moved faster than any other species could move, and her consciousness was sharpened to a razor point with only one goal—killing Tobin Solo Artin.

Through the Force Tobin could feel his wife—he knew she lived. He could feel soldiers fighting and dying outside of the palace. He knew now that the future was secured even if he died. As long as Mariha lived—as long as their son lived—he knew he could die in peace.

But the Force had other plans.

Their fight was momentarily interrupted when the far entrance exploded. Blackguard troops spilled out, but not to attack. Rather their backs were to the two combatants as they fought a rearguard action against a swarm of troopers in heavy assault armor—mechanized battle suits that carried the heaviest weapons available off a capital ship.

"Well," Tobin said, gasping for breath, "it would appear your plans have faltered."

Hubrin's muscles and nerves contracted momentarily into something resembling a human shape, and from that shape she grinned. "You think so, Artin?"

Then Tobin felt it, and his heart constricted in terror. Mariha was there, in the palace, and somehow Hubrin knew it. The Gen'Dai shot off, moving in some obscene parody of a run that covered ground faster than even Tobin could, and moved straight for the entrance where Mariha emerged, respondent in white armor with her purple lightsaber flashing.

_Mariha, watch out!_ Tobin shouted into the Force.

The Empress had just a moment to look up and see the Gen'Dai barreling toward her before she launched herself into a twenty-foot somersault over Hubrin. Whatever her powers were, not even the Gen-Dai could arrest their own momentum that quickly. It bought Mariha time to land in a roll and run toward Tobin before Hubrin barreled after them.

"What is she?" Mariha said.

"Gen'Dai," Tobin said. "Whatever the hell that is. She's faster than we are, even with the Force, and she can reattach limbs instantly. What are you doing here?"

"Saving you!" she snapped back.

"Jump!" Tobin shouted.

The two launched themselves away from each other as Hubrin attacked. Rather than pick one or the other, Hubrin shot limbs out after both, only to jerk them back as both were amputated. Tobin Force-threw the beast away and rejoined his wife, falling in time with her as if they had been fighting together their whole lives.

Outside their combat zone, the last of the Blackguards fell, which gave Shandor's men the time they needed to take out the defensive emplacements and shields. The end was approaching, but none of that mattered for Tobin and Mariha.

They moved as one, like two limbs for attack and defense. Tobin felt a surge in the Force as he realized that with Mariha, he was stronger than he was alone. And in this new strength, he realized what needed to happen.

"I have a plan!" he shouted.

"I don't like the sound of that," Mariha snapped back.

They twirled away from another attack, this one glancing across Mariha's brow and sending her stumbling. Tobin grabbed her with the Force just as Hubrin made a huge first and cracked the floor in a blow that would have killed the Empress.

"It's a good plan!" he assured her as he spun her away to defend against another assault.

"So tell me!" she said.

He did, through the Force. He sent images and his desires to her, and his fear of what it could do. The Gen'Dai was functionally immortal, and if she got away she would always be a threat not just to them and their empire, but to their children.

Mariha did not even bother to respond aloud. With a grunt at the effort, she reached out both hands and grasped the Gen'Dai in the Force, lifting it twenty-feet into the air. Hubrin responded with shooting limbs, but Tobin was there instantly, cutting the limbs off with ruthless efficiency. He Force-pushed every limb away to prevent her from reattaching them again, until at last she'd lost enough muscle mass she stopped trying.

"So now we shoot it?" Mariha said, straining.

"Shooting won't kill it," Tobin said with conviction. "Not while any of it lives. No, there's only one way to deal with this."

"Tobin?"

He ignored her and shot himself forward, flying into the air until he landed right on the stunned Hubrin. To Mariha's horror, Hubrin seemed to expand and suck him into her body.

"No!" Mariha said. She let Hubrin fall and ran forward, prepared to chop her husband free. It was only the Force that stilled her hand.

Hubrin writhed on the floor, howling in agony as a red light seemed to glow from within her.

"Empress!" a trooper called.

Mariha turned and saw with shock that the amputated pieces of muscle were wilting into dry, desiccated strands of meat and gristle. She turned back to Hubrin and saw that her whole body seemed to be drying out, while the red light from within her grew brighter and brighter.

Moments later, she saw her husband free himself, even as he continued to place his hands on Hubrin's body. The red light came from his hands, while his face was warped with an expression of agony. Still, he did not relent until at the very last, Hubrin's last strange of muscle dried into a husk.

Tobin straightened and stumbled away toward the throne, and Mariha followed without a thought. She found him kneeling in the hidden space behind the throne, throwing up violently. She tried to approach, but had to back away at the sickening, twisted feel of him in the Force.

"Tobin?"

"It was a Sith technique," he said between gags. "A way to drain your enemy's life force. It was the only way to kill Hubrin. The force of her life itself was her only weakness."

"What's wrong with you?"

"It was a twisted life," he said. "Stand back. I need to get rid of it."

She did as she was told and watched as Tobin straightened, yelled at the top of his lungs and fired a veritable thunder-storm of Force-lightning into the air. She glanced over her shoulder and saw troopers kneeling down, some making the sign of the Unitarian sigil as they did so. She looked back as the last of the lightening left his hands, and Tobin Solo Artin, first Emperor of that name, collapsed unconscious to the ground.

The battle for the future was over, and somehow, they won.

* * *

**Epilogue: The Future Begins**

"Initiate Anakin Skywalker Fel, kneel."

The young man with curly black hair tinged with natural red highlights knelt before the Emperor and Empress. Behind him the rest of the newly initiated knights stood with their silver lightsabers blazing in the otherwise darkened room, casting a silvery light over the initiate and his master. Otherwise the throne room was empty.

"You have trained with dedication and skill for this day," the Emperor intoned. "You have shown leadership, intelligence and strength. You have shown mercy when warranted, and ruthlessness when needed. You have saved the innocent and destroyed the wicked, and you have served the Empire well. Do you wish now to dedicate your life to the Empire and enter the Order?"

"By the Force and all my heart, I do," the Initiate said with his head bowed.

"Then say the words, Initiate, and let the Force know the truth of them."

"I walk the path between emotion and peace. I reject ignorance and seek knowledge. I embrace both passion and serenity. I hover between chaos and harmony. I accept that there is no death, only the Force. I am Force, and the Force is me; I am the Empire, and the Empire is me. Through the Force, I make the Empire strong, and through the Empire I am made strong. I pledge my life, my soul and my power to protect and serve the people of the Empire. On the Force I do so swear."

The Emperor did not smile, but next to him the Empress did.

"Rise, Anakin."

Anakin twenty-year years of age, stood straight in his red Initiate's gear. The Emperor stepped down and reached out his hands to show two lightsaber handles. Anakin took them wordlessly and lit both—they were the silver of the other knights.

"Anakin Skywalker Fel, in the name of the Force I declare you a Knight of the Empire, with all the rights and responsibilities therein. Let all the Empire know you as a member of the Order of the Republic."

The Empress quietly stepped down from the dias and by the light of the lightsabers draped the red armored chestplate over his shoulders. The chestplate was decorated with the Unitarian sigil bisected by a lightsaber.

"You have earned your place among the knights," the Emperor continued. "By the words of Knight General Aaris Bard, you achieved the highest rank possible on your trials. I would be proud of you on your merits alone. The fact that you are also my son fills me with a happiness I cannot expression."

Anakin extinguished his swords as the Emperor stepped forward and embraced his son. "The future is you, my boy," Tobin whispered. "Make it a good one."

"I will, Father," Anakin said as he returned the embrace. "Not for the Empire. Not for the Force. But for you."

Tobin stepped back. "My friends, may I present my son, Knight of the Empire Anakin Skywalker Fel."

The Order of the Empire, which was now composed of almost a hundred Knights, as one raised their silver ligthsabers and roared their approval.

Tobin stepped back to let his son mingle with his friends and fellow knights. He felt Mariha take his hand. "He has done remarkably," she said.

"He is everything I hoped," Tobin agreed.

Mariha leaned over to whisper in his ear. "As good as he did, though, Jaina will do better."

Tobin turned and looked at their sixteen-year-old daughter who had her mother's fiery red hair and temperament. She wore the red uniform of an initiate herself, and watched her brother's celebration with wistful smile, as if she were seeing herself.

Tobin turned to his wife and kissed her. "I'll take that bet."

"You'll lose."

"And I'll be happy to do so," he said. "Because in the end I'll still win. With him I see myself; with her I see you. And together—together there is nothing they won't be able to accomplish."

She took his hand and raised it to her lips. "Just like us."

"Like us," he agreed. "I love you."

"I know."

With a laugh, the two held each other and watched their children celebrate, while around them they knew their Empire was strong and, at least for the moment, the Force was in balance. It was everything Tobin could hope for.

"Thank you, Klinti," he whispered.

_Your welcome,_ the Force whispered back with a hint of Klinti's voice.

Yes, Tobin realized, it was everything he could have hoped for and more.

* * *

The last two chapters in a flurry. Please note I had to do some real work-arounds to get these up, so I apologize for any formatting issues you may encounter.

Thank you all for reading!


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